Crews working day in and day out to battle high water in Mayo will take New Year's Day off.

"We are that optimistic with the work we have done that we can walk away for 24 hours,” Don Hutton, incident commander for the Emergency Measures Organization, said this morning.

Hutton said the diversion channel crews built last Sunday and Monday seems to be doing the job of redirecting overflow from the Mayo River away from the dike running between the river and the low-lying area leading into town.

For two days now, there has been no water seeping onto the highway, he pointed out.

"Water seeping on the highway a couple of weeks ago was the initial indication we had a problem,” he said. "I am encouraged what we are doing is working.”

Flooding inside the dike apparently arose when overflow from the river began running up a low-lying area of the structure and eventually began seeping beneath it and filling up what Hutton described as the flood plain.

Yukon Energy's yard where the backup diesel generator is located was flooded, forcing the corporation to build an ice and gravel berm around the buildings, though water never did get inside.

The water level at a neighbouring property is also high but has not reached floor level in his basement sump.

Hutton said it appears they've halted the inflow of water beneath the dike, though it's difficult to say how long it will take for water to drain from the flood plain.

It probably took a week or two to fill up before the problem was noticed on the highway, he said.

Hutton said a boil-water advisory remains in effect for the community of 450 as a precautionary measure to prevent any issues around ground water which may have been contaminated from septic systems.

All of the water samples taken to date have come back negative, he said.

Hutton pointed out results of the most recent sample were expected this morning during the daily briefing of the various organizations involved in the emergency response.

Problems with one of the two backhoes assigned to river work prevented crews from constructing a second channel to increase the flow of diversion away from the dike but they were going to be back at it today, he said.