April 2026, which brought disastrous flooding to northern Lower Michigan and high water levels throughout the state, proved to be the wettest on record for several places in Michigan.
According to the National Weather Service, communities including Gaylord, Houghton Lake, Traverse City and Flint all set monthly precipitation records during the month.
Wettest April on record
Gaylord: The Otsego County seat was inundated with 9.31 inches of precipitation during April, including 2.3 inches of snow, NWS reported. That’s a record for the month and more than 6 inches above average. The wettest single day in Gaylord was April 12, when 3.56 inches of rain fell, the most ever on record, according to NWS.
Traverse City: Weather spotters there recorded 8.63 inches of precipitation during April, which is 5.19 inches above normal for the month and a new record for the city.
Houghton Lake: Some 8.08 inches of precipitation fell on this central Lower Michigan community in Roscommon County, a record for the month of April and nearly 5 inches above average for the month.
Alpena: This city on Lake Huron received 5.89 inches of rain during April. That’s nearly 3 inches above average and the second most ever on record for the month.
Flint: While the northern half of Lower Michigan saw the worst flooding during April, the southern half also experienced record rainfall. Flint saw 6.5 inches of precipitation throughout the month, breaking the previous record of 6.44 inches set in April 2013. Flint gets about 3.41 inches of precipitation during an average April, according to NWS data.
Up to 400% above average
Virtually all of northern Lower Michigan received between 200% and 400% of its usual amount of rainfall during the month of April. Parts of Alcona, Antrim, Benzie, Crawford, Grand Traverse, Iosco, Kalkaska, Leelanau, Manistee, Missaukee, Otsego, Roscommon and Wexford were especially above average.
A flood warning remains in effect through Thursday evening for Lower Michigan’s two northernmost counties: Cheboygan and Emmet. Flooding continues to occur there, NWS said, spurred by rain and snowmelt.
State and local officials have been monitoring the Cheboygan Lock and Dam Complex for about a month for fear that the Cheboygan River would spill overtop the structure. As of Tuesday, the river was 16.8 inches from the top of the dam.
The record rain was part of what has been a staggeringly wet spring throughout the Great Lakes region, according to weather.com senior meteorologist Jonathan Erdman.
Through mid-April cities around the region including Grand Rapids, Michigan; Chicago; Toledo, Ohio; Buffalo, New York; and Madison, Wisconsin, had already each experienced their wettest springs to date, Erdman said in a blog post.
mreinhart@detroitnews.com
This article originally appeared on The Detroit News: April 2026 was the wettest ever for these Michigan cities
Reporting by Max Reinhart, The Detroit News / The Detroit News
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
