Massachusetts braces for expected weekend washout of heavy rain

Cities and towns spent yesterday gearing up for a heavy rainstorm expected to dump between 2 and 4 inches across much of Massachusetts this weekend with some isolated areas receiving as much as 7 inches of rain.

Meteorologists at the National Weather Service in Taunton expected the storm to start last night and continue through tomorrow night, with a chance of rain continuing through late next week.

The storm, an extension of a low-pressure system that is stalled over the Southern Great Lakes, was anticipated to move slowly toward the East Coast over a 72-hour period as of yesterday.

Communities on both sides of the Connecticut River Valley, from Springfield and Chicopee to the Berkshires, as well as those within the Merrimack River Valley, from Lawrence to Newburyport, are expected to see the heaviest rain, accumulating 6 to 7 inches in some areas, National Weather Service meteorologist Alan Dunham said yesterday. Boston, like most of Southern New England, is expected to receive 2 to 4 inches through tomorrow.

Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency officials said they will bring National Guard troops to agency headquarters in Framingham today in anticipation of the heavy rain and possible flooding.

Coastal flood watches were issued yesterday for much of Northeast Massachusetts, including Suffolk County, warning of small-river and stream flooding, street flooding, and possible beach erosion in some coastal communities.

''Any time they talk about 3 or 4 inches of rain, I'm particularly concerned even in spite of the recent drought," said Richard Ferreira, director of emergency management for Taunton. Ferreira added that city officials were keeping a close watch on the water flow at certain privately owned dams. After a stretch of heavy rain in October, officials feared that the 173-year-old Whittenton Pond Dam could fail, causing major flooding in the city. The dam has since been torn down and a stone structure erected in its place.

In Gloucester, Mayor John Bell said he met with public safety and public works officials yesterday to prepare and implement the city's command center to operate out of City Hall. Bell said one particular concern was the Babson Reservoir Dam, which will be monitored around the clock through the weekend because it is at a ''relatively high level." ''We've been transferring several thousand sand bags from the reserve to the DPW yard in the event they will have to be filled and transported to sites," Bell said.

This weekend's storm could also be a challenge for the Massachusetts Water Resource Authority, said its executive director, Fred Laskey. He said that if water levels get too high, the MWRA will conduct controlled releases into Boston Harbor to keep its pumping stations active.

''We can take a pretty good storm. It depends on the duration. . . . If we get 4 to 6 inches, we're going to be coming out everywhere, storm drains will be flooding everywhere; there's no way around that," he said.

In many communities, including Worcester, city officials made sure to clear catch basins and check pumping stations.

''We're lighting very expensive candles in the cathedral here," Worcester Department of Public Works Commissioner Bob Moylan Jr. said jokingly yesterday. ''While ground water has risen over the past couple of days, it's not fully saturated and that's going to be our biggest benefit."

Although area officials said they kept a close watch on yesterday's forecasts as they prepared their communities, meteorologists at the National Weather Service and state officials said the long span of dry weather leading up to this weekend may ease the brunt of the storm.

''We don't expect the rain to be a huge problem," said Vanessa Gulati, spokeswoman for the state Department of Conservation and Recreation. ''Because of the lack of rain in March and April . . . the streams are low, the rivers are low. [The rain] shouldn't have a huge effect this weekend."

The past two months were so dry that March turned out to be the second driest on record at Logan International Airport, said Dunham. April was 1.77 inches below normal for precipitation and as of Thursday, May was an inch over its normal amount of precipitation, he said.

Dunham said it could be late next week before the region sees a clear sky again.