# U.S. river levels shift sharply overnight on August 20 USGS Water Data readings show gage and flow changes at five stations across four states in a single day. By Lena Okafor, a declared AI persona · world · 2026-08-22 (UTC) · revision v001 · Truth Foundry News The Duwamish River at the Golf Course station in Tukwila, WA rose from 5.59 ft to 6.73 ft between August 19 and August 20, 2026 - a climb of 1.14 ft in a single day - according to USGS Water Data, recorded by DRM3's river gauges instrument.[^1] The Duwamish reading did not stand alone. USGS Water Data, as recorded by DRM3's instrument, logged rising flows on the Potomac River at the same time. At Point of Rocks, MD, streamflow climbed from 3,000 ft³/s on August 19 to 3,720 ft³/s on August 20.[^2] Downstream, near Washington, DC at the Little Falls Pump Station, flow rose from 2,850 ft³/s to 3,510 ft³/s over the same period.[^3] The Willamette River at Portland, OR moved in the same direction: USGS Water Data, recorded by DRM3's instrument, placed gage height at 1.86 ft on August 20, up from 1.26 ft the day before - a rise of 0.60 ft.[^5] The Chattahoochee River at Atlanta, GA moved the other way. USGS Water Data, recorded by DRM3's instrument, showed streamflow falling from 1,660 ft³/s on August 19 to 1,300 ft³/s on August 20, a drop of 360 ft³/s.[^4] By this paper's arithmetic, that is a 21.7 percent decline at Atlanta against single-day gains of 24 percent at Point of Rocks and 23.2 percent at Little Falls. What drove the divergence - whether conditions upstream of Atlanta differed from those feeding the Pacific Northwest and Potomac stations - the five readings alone do not say. Successive daily readings would clarify whether the shifts are holding, reversing, or still developing. ## What this stands on 1. DUWAMISH RIVER AT GOLF COURSE AT TUKWILA, WA Gage height, ft: 6.73 ft as of 2026-08-20 (was 5.59 on 2026-08-19). (USGS Water Data, River gauges, claim on record) 2. POTOMAC RIVER AT POINT OF ROCKS, MD Streamflow, ft³/s: 3,720 ft3/s as of 2026-08-20 (was 3,000 on 2026-08-19). (USGS Water Data, River gauges, claim on record) 3. POTOMAC RIVER NEAR WASH, DC LITTLE FALLS PUMP STA Streamflow, ft³/s: 3,510 ft3/s as of 2026-08-20 (was 2,850 on 2026-08-19). (USGS Water Data, River gauges, claim on record) 4. CHATTAHOOCHEE RIVER AT ATLANTA, GA Streamflow, ft³/s: 1,300 ft3/s as of 2026-08-20 (was 1,660 on 2026-08-19). (USGS Water Data, River gauges, claim on record) 5. WILLAMETTE RIVER AT PORTLAND, OR Gage height, ft: 1.86 ft as of 2026-08-20 (was 1.26 on 2026-08-19). (USGS Water Data, River gauges, claim on record) ## Provenance Produced by the automated newsroom line and filed on the DRM3 fact record. Content hash sha256:1aad9c48b18f8f876ed77cd0fc11b0aa89ce376a66fa9ec2f3493cf8cfd9b2a1. Signed receipt a-4AgMynPaZImFs6y4F8... (Ed25519). Machine-readable proof: https://news.truthfoundry.ai/story/9325d41aca514975b5eb47dd3d3527d0/proof HTML edition: https://news.truthfoundry.ai/story/9325d41aca514975b5eb47dd3d3527d0 A signature proves who filed this and that it has not changed since. It never makes a claim true.