North Dakota ? Officials in Fargo and Minnesota issued urgent pleas for volunteers to help with sandbagging as a storm on Sunday increased the threat of flood in an area already expected to be swamped by a record river crest.

The National Weather Service said the Red River was about 3 feet above flood stage Sunday in Fargo and more water was on the way. The river was expected to crest between 39 feet and 41 feet in the Fargo-Moorhead area by Friday, a day earlier and a foot higher than projected.

City officials originally planned to fill more than 1 million sandbags but now believe they need nearly 1.9 million bags to protect neighborhoods that would be affected by the new projections.