Officials in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, hit by days of flooding, warn that the city's fresh water supply will run out within three to four days at current rates of consumption. Citizens are being urged to conserve drinking water to stretch out the supply.
Authorities say three of the city's four collection wells have been contaminated.
Some 24,000 residents of Cedar Rapids there have been forced from their homes; more thunderstorms are predicted for Sunday.
In Iowa City, more than 200 homes have been evacuated because the Iowa River is still rising. It's expected to crest Monday or Tuesday.
At the University of Iowa, people who were busy filling thousands of sandbags were forced to abandon their work when the flood was considered too dangerous to continue.
Iowa's capital Des Moines was swamped Saturday when a levee holding back floodwaters broke, sending water rushing into a neighborhood near downtown.
Storms and subsequent flooding are blamed in at least three deaths in Iowa.
The state has born the brunt of the flooding that has affected Kansas, Missouri, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Michigan, Illinois and Indiana.
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