Manhattan was built on a floodplain at the junction of the Kansas and Big Blue rivers, and it has faced recurring problems with flooding during times of heavy precipitation. The worst floods in Manhattan's history were the 1903 and 1908 floods, the Great Flood of 1951 and the Great Flood of 1993. In Spring/Summer 2019, record amounts of rainfall in Kansas brought water levels up massive amounts and flood records were broken that had not been seen since 1993. Tuttle Creek Reservoir recorded its second highest flood level ever on May 31 at 1,135.80 feet above sea-level. The only level higher came from The Great Flood of 1993, which recorded an astounding 1,138 feet above sea-level on July 23. The top of Tuttle Creek's emergency Spillway gates measure at 1,136 feet, only 0.2 feet above the 2019 record lake level. The only time that the emergency Spillway gates have ever been opened was on July 19, 1993 at 3:15 PM. The gates were opened 0.8 feet which allowed 10,000 cubic feet per second of water to move through the downstream channel. The gates were slowly opened more and more each day until July 23 when they reached a peak 60,000 cubic feet per second (450,000 Gallons per second). The gates remained open until August 9, 1993. The normal level for Tuttle Creek Reservoir sits at an average of 1,075 feet.