The rain from Hurricane Irma is gone, but the overflow is still pouring into Lake Okeechobee.
Levels right now are just under 15 feet, but expected to rise to 17 feet if no action is taken.
Friday morning the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers decided to take action starting the process of discharging billions of gallons of water into the St. Lucie Estuary.
At Central Marine in Martin County, Mary Radabaugh is still cleaning up from Irma. Now boaters are warning her about algae in the lake.
"Green algae is on its way," said Radabaugh.
Mark Perry with Florida's Oceanographic Society is worried discharges combined with runoff in the St. Lucie Basin could result in algae blooms.
"If it gets up in the 80s we're really concerned also with the nutrients we get and also we get a lot of sunlight," said Perry.
Martin County leaders sent this statement in response to the discharges:
"Although Martin County has long-standing concerns with any releases from Lake Okeechobee due to their extreme impacts to our ecosystem and local economy, we do acknowledge the difficult position that the Army Corps of Engineers is in due to extreme water conditions associated with Hurricane Irma, especially on the west coast and in the Kissimmee Basin. We remain hopeful that the Corps continues to exercise all options to move water through the greater Everglades ecosystem to alleviate flood conditions and restore south Florida to a pre-storm condition."
