BRECKENRIDGE, MINN. - Breckenridge Mayor Cliff Barth stood to signal adjournment of a Friday meeting of flood response leaders who had just heard that the waters of the Red River through town would crest higher than they'd planned for.

"OK," Barth said decisively, "let's start moving clay."

But later, when asked how he felt about having to raise the level of the city's protection half a foot above the earlier target, he took another tone. He was discouraged and angry, he said. "You get tired of worrying."

Because the city he governs sits where the Red River forms from two tributaries, Barth's concern is echoed in dozens of cities and counties downstream of the north-flowing Red.

They're now worried that, according to forecast updates Friday from the National Weather Service, the coming days could bring Red River flood crests that could match what they saw most recently in 2001, among the highest ever.

"We watch how their water levels are very closely," said Moorhead Mayor Mark Voxland. "What happens in Breckenridge is the cue for what will happen here in a few days."

The Wild Rice River, which feeds into the Red downstream, is expected to approach the level it reached during the catastrophic flood season of 1997.

The first flood-related death was reported early Friday near Grand Forks. A 57-year-old woman from Manvel, N.D., apparently stumbled into a water-filled ditch along Interstate Hwy. 29 after driving her vehicle into water about 2 feet deep, authorities said.

The Red is expected to crest at Breckenridge and its twin city, Wahpeton, N.D., late this afternoon at up to 17.5 feet -- 7.5 feet above flood stage, 1.9 feet below the 1997 record. After heavy rains overnight Thursday mixed with a rapid snow melt, the crest range is up to a foot higher than predicted earlier.

Flood fighting may involve heavy lifting, but it requires delicate calculations, Barth noted. In 2001, he said, the city overbuilt its temporary protections, angering residents whose yards got torn up unnecessarily and costing the city thousands of dollars in repairs.

"We guaranteed every citizen's feet would stay dry," he said. And this year? No boasting, he said.

Barth enthusiastically endorsed the effectiveness of a new channel that diverts part of the Otter Tail River's flow to meet the Red north of town. He said that until Friday, the city was prepared for a crest of 16.5 feet. But Friday's news meant that workers would have to build the ramparts higher and work quickly to fill gaps in the levees and dikes.

Meanwhile, many communities in the valley have begun offering residents sandbags for their own use, while Fargo expanded the number of flood-prone houses for which it will have to build dikes from about 20 to nearly three dozen.

Barth and other leaders of communities along the Red met Friday in Moorhead with Gov. Tim Pawlenty. Most expressed confidence in new flood controls, which, they said, should minimize any flooding. Pawlenty, responding to requests from valley counties and cities, has authorized the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the National Guard to help in the response.

Rural areas Friday had water flowing across fields and roads, in some cases whipped by high winds into whitecaps. Creeks and small rivers were flowing heavily through woods and adjacent fields, and some farmsteads were surrounded by shallow water. Hwy. 75, the main road from Breckenridge to Moorhead, was closed north of Breckenridge because a quarter-mile-wide river was flowing across it.

East of Breckenridge, along Hwy. 210, utility poles that were snapped off in November's ice storms bobbed in ditches, along with sugar beets and crop stubble. A small clay dike on one stretch turned the windblown floodwaters into spray.

Bob Yaggie, who has farmed nearby since 1967, said it was the second- or third-worst flooding he's seen. Virtually all his structures were standing in water, but he expected it to subside as quickly as it came -- which was overnight.

"We had a lot of snow 30 hours ago," he said. "We knew it was coming. I gave my [five employees] the day off. ...It was a great management decision."