Officials in High River say they are prepared to respond in the event that the Highwood River spills its banks and causes flooding in low lying areas.

A rainfall warning has been issued for the area and up to 125 mm of rain is expected to fall by Saturday.

The town says that levels in the Highwood River are at safe levels for now but the river will likely rise over the next few days.

“The Highwood starts to overflow its banks at about 200 cubic metres per second so anything over 200 and we start taking on low level flooding in our lower areas,” said Ross Shapka from the Town of High River.

High River staff has made a supply of sandbags available to residents and are making sure all emergency equipment is ready to go should they need it.

“I have a sump pump. I have boards that I can put over my basement windows and plastic. I do have a few sand bags that I can put up against my garage door if it should rise up my driveway which it did in 2005,” said one resident.

Firefighters have also placed flood tubes in northwest High River as a precaution.

Residents are being encouraged to use caution near the river as the rain has created extremely strong currents and softened the banks.

“Because of the prediction that we got, we started doing some preparatory work. We’ve built a couple of thousand sand bags to have on hand to protect town infrastructure. We put out our flood tubes in the northwest in an area that we experienced overland water and we’ll be doing that in Wallaceville as well and we’ll be physically setting up our EOC tomorrow morning just in case we need it to activate it tomorrow afternoon or Saturday morning,” said Shapka.

The town is providing updates on its Twitter feed @TownOfHighRiver and Facebook page.

The town has also created a High Water and Flood Resources page on its website and will be posting regular updates on water levels.

The warning also covers Airdrie, Cochrane, Olds, Sundre, Nordegg, Kananaskis, Canmore, Claresholm and Okotoks.

A rainfall warning was also issued for Crowsnest Pass, Pincher Creek and Waterton Lakes National Park but it ended just after 5:30 p.m.

Environment Canada says a slow moving system has moved into the area and the warnings may be expanded to other parts of southern Alberta if the system evolves.