Stephanie L. Sunder would expect to see flash flooding in her adopted home of Texas more than she would in her native Northeast Pennsylvania.

So she was still somewhat shocked by the recent weather as she decided to stop by the Tannery Bridge over the Lehigh River on Friday to check out the elevated water levels from the rain and a subsequent dam release.

“It rained a day or two, but this has been five days straight, and it was near constant,” she said. “There are areas that are flooded that I’ve never seen flooded.”

For several hours on Friday, water poured into the Lehigh River from the roaring spillway at Francis E. Walter Dam near White Haven at a rate of 6,000 cubic feet per second.

The Army Corps of Engineers decided that water level downstream had fallen enough after a week of heavy rain to release some of the water that it held back in order to prevent flood damage along the river.

The excess water won’t push the river anywhere close to flood stage because levels have fallen significantly, according to National Weather Service forecasters.

Water flowed from Francis Walter at a peak of 6,000 CFS, seven times as much water as a normal scheduled whitewater release from the dam.

While the dam is perhaps best known for its whitewater releases, its primary function is preventing flood damage along the Lehigh River.

According to the Army Corps, they released the water to try to get Walter back closer to its normal elevation after four days of retaining water to prevent flood damage — the dam’s primary function.

“The dam’s pool elevation has risen approximately 30 feet since the Army Corps began storing water on July 24 to reduce the risk of flooding for downstream conditions,” the Corps’ Philadelphia District said in a news release Friday.

Beltzville Dam also released water at 1,200 CFS, which is also a relatively high figure.

The National Weather Service Middle Atlantic River Forecast Center is constantly tracking water levels on the Lehigh.

Hydrometeorologist Ted Rodgers said the dam has done its job by retaining water that would have pushed the river higher during the heavy rains earlier this week, and now they’re releasing some of that water.

“They’ve held a lot back to let all of the runoff from the rain pass downstream. They feel it’s safe now based on the downstream forecast to let some of it go,” Rodgers said.

The Army Corps announced Friday afternoon that they were halting the big release from Walter because of storms forecast for the area. They said they would reassess Saturday morning.

Even with additional storms in the forecast, Rodgers said the Lehigh River will not come close to flood levels.

“There will be a bump from this, but certainly we’re not going to be near any critical levels,” Rodgers said.

Models show the river gauge at Lehighton going up to approximately 7.5 feet, and approximately 9,000-10,000 cubic feet per second. At Lehighton, 17,500 CFS is considered flood flow. Even with the storms, there is no risk that it will get to that level.

“Even with additional rain falling, that’s a lot of volume to accumulate over several hours,” Rodgers said.

At Walnutport, where flood flow is 38,000 CFS, the prospect of a flood was even more remote. Flow was expected to top out at 11,500 CFS Friday night.