re: Morganza Spillway may or may not open for a 3rd time -- lack of clear info from ACoE

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I'm not sure how that compares to previous forecasts, though. I haven't kept up with that gauge.

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Except for that little bump, it's about the same

Mapped it on Google earth and its right at 100 miles

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Mapped it on Google earth and its right at 100 miles

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That's about right. Baton Rouge to New Orleans is 133 river miles.

ETA - 102 it is.

My Google earth game is strong


On another note. Lots of water flowing in the creeks through the Felicianas. With Thompson creek @ US 61 already high from the river, won’t take much to top that bridge and close a major highway

From looking at the latest pics, it’s gonna open whether they want it to or not!!!!yikes

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IIRC when the bend levee in East Carrol Parish broke in '11. The river level in Memphis fell like over a foot in less than an hour. The bend is roughly 250 miles from Memphis. So yes they can.


That's really hard to believe unless you're exaggerating a decent amount.

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Not exaggerating but my memory was faulty.

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On May 12, the Mississippi River reached 63.5 feet on the Greenville gage and 54.5 feet on the Vicksburg gage. The river was also climbing fast at the Natchez gage, having reached 58 feet, more than ten feet above fl ood stage. By 0800 hours the following day, the river stormed past 64 feet on the Greenville gage. The crest, which had yet to reach the Arkansas City gage further upriver, was still at least four days away. Everyone expected the river to continue to rise. At 1400 hours, the gage stood at 64.13 feet, but the gage reading an hour later depicted a drop in river levels by three-hundredths. The reading at 1600 hours showed another drop. By 1800 hours, the river had dropped back below 64 feet on the gage. The 2000 hours gage reading recorded yet another drop, down a tenth of a foot from two hours earlier. Walter Mattingly, working in the Vicksburg district’s emergency operation center, called Ron Goldman at home and told him, “The stage is falling at Greenville.” 209 Chapter Four – The River Wants Out Those words hit Goldman like a bombshell. He was scared and understandably so. A sudden drop in a river gage prior to the arrival of the crest could only mean the gage had malfunctioned or, worse, a levee had fi nally succumbed to the relentless pressure of the river. He immediately returned to the district offi ce to determine the cause of the problem. Mattingly also contacted Paul Keene at the district’s Greenwood area offi ce. Keene began organizing the sector commanders on both sides of the river to inspect the levees to determine if a breach had taken place.217 Keene, in turn, notifi ed the Mississippi Levee Board. Upon hearing the news, Thompson decided to call Nimrod, who was at his Greenville home stealing a few hours to get some much needed sleep. Nimrod had left his cellular phone in the kitchen and did not hear it ringing. Thompson hung up and called Nimrod’s house phone. When Nimrod answered Thompson informed him of the news, “Peter, something’s wrong! The gage just dropped!” The sudden rush of adrenaline immediately sapped the fog of weariness from the chief engineer of the levee board. Thompson passed on the Vicksburg district’s belief that either the gage had malfunctioned or a levee had breached. Within minutes, the Greenwood area offi ce notifi ed Nimrod that the gage was working properly and that water marks on a nearby sign post also depicted a drop in river levels. By 2100 hours, the gage reading had dropped another tenth of a foot, which confi rmed water was leaving the system somewhere. Nimrod began calling members of his crews. They had spent the day riding the levees with personnel from the Greenwood area offi ce and would have noticed any problems. None reported noticing anything substantial. Nimrod pondered his next step. The gage had checked out. It was working properly. His levees checked out. No breaks were found. Perhaps a levee crevassed on the other side of the river. The clock was nearing midnight. The river had dropped six inches over the previous nine hours. Nimrod called Sam Angel, a member of the Mississippi River Commission who lived across the river in Lake Village, Arkansas. “Mr. Angel, did the levee break on your side?” he asked. Angel, who 210 Divine Providence had been asleep when his telephone rang, considered the question an odd one. “Not that I know of,” he replied. Nimrod explained the situation. Angel indicated that he would check with levee district offi cials in Arkansas, but he soon discovered that no break had been reported.218 By 0300 hours the following morning – May 14 – the river stopped falling on the Greenville gage and resumed its ascent. Within hours, the water control managers at the district offi ce had determined the culprit. On May 12, the river overtopped an abandoned MR&T levee at Wilson Point, near Lake Providence, Louisiana. The Mississippi River Commission had constructed a new mainline levee further to the west, but the abandoned levee remained intact, providing substantial protection for approximately 12,000 acres of prime farmland. In the early afternoon of May 13, the abandoned levee –with close to a foot of water violently pouring over its crown and landside slope – crevassed, allowing the river to fi ll the 12,000-acre bowl between the levees. The incident proved to be a false alarm in terms of a possible catastrophic break in the levee system, but it served notice of the destructive dynamics involved in the overtopping of a levee. The Wilson Point levee had crevassed with a foot of water pouring over the levee after only one day. Residents in the Mississippi delta took notice of that. All eyes nervously turned to the newly-armored Yazoo backwater levee, which was expected to be overtopped by more than a foot of water for ten long days. Admittedly, the Wilson Point levee was not an MR&T levee, and it had not been armored as the backwater levee had, but it was originally constructed to MR&T specifi cations. Residents continued to watch and pray as the river inched higher and higher against the backwater levee

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It was the Greenville gauge not the memphis gauge and it fell roughly a foot in 12 hours.

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First off, it's Wilson Point and it's ~30 miles downstream of the Greenville gage. According to the posters above (who I choose to believe), BR is ~3x further upstream of the BC spillway.

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You chose to believe wrong baw.

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There are 41.85 miles from Lake Providence to Greenville in north direction and 53 miles (85.30 kilometers) by car, following the US-65 route.

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LINK

According to the USACE ( see pages 82 - 94Greenville gage is located at river mile 530 and the break at Willow Point occurred at Pittman Island at river mile 503. So it is 27 miles on the navigational charts but the navigational charts do not measure the distance between the levees but outside of the river channel. If you drive the levee from the Greenville bridge which is just south of Greenville gage to Pittman Island it is around 50 miles. Google maps says that its around 30 but google maps is wrong. I know from personal experience because I have taken the levee back to my hunting camp on Pittman Island from the casinos in Greenville avoid getting a dwi from the police in Lake Village many times during hunting season over the years and I clocked it with the odometer in my truck. Then if you stay on the levee pass the turn for Pittman Island it is 6 miles to where the break at Willow Point occurred. However that does not really matter, I was just explaining how I got roughly 60 miles.

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Your own quote says the Greenville gage only fell ~0.5 ft in 12 hrs, before the point filled up.

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No it does not.

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Thompson passed on the Vicksburg district’s belief that either the gage had malfunctioned or a levee had breached. Within minutes, the Greenwood area offi ce notifi ed Nimrod that the gage was working properly and that water marks on a nearby sign post also depicted a drop in river levels. By 2100 hours, the gage reading had dropped another tenth of a foot, which confi rmed water was leaving the system somewhere. Nimrod began calling members of his crews. They had spent the day riding the levees with personnel from the Greenwood area offi ce and would have noticed any problems. None reported noticing anything substantial. Nimrod pondered his next step. The gage had checked out. It was working properly. His levees checked out. No breaks were found. Perhaps a levee crevassed on the other side of the river. The clock was nearing midnight. The river had dropped six inches over the previous nine hours.

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It says that the river fell 6 inches in the 9 hours between 15:00 on 5/13/2011 when they first noticed the break until 00:00 on 5/14/2011. The point did not fill enough for the river to start rising until 03:00 on 5/14/2011. That means that the river at Greenville gage was dropping by 0.67 inches per hour. 0.67 inches/hour * 12 hours = 8 inches which is close enough to about a foot in 12 hours.

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The Wilson Point bowl is stated to be 12,000 acres. Google Earth tells me the Wilson point front line levee is between 20 and 25 ft above the natural ground elevation of the farmland it protects...and it had 1 ft of water above it.

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Wrong. The old levee had sandbags piled up a foot high when the levee gave way. I saw it about two hours afterwards because I was having to help my girlfriend's (at the time) father move his equipment out because he farmed in the point and he was desperately trying to get his cotton planted before the levee broke so he could claim insurance on those acres. The water got much deeper than a foot as this picture from inside the point shows.

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Granted, there are some assumptions, the most problematic of which is that the BC constantly removes flow from the river while in operation, whereas the breach at Wilson Point only removed flow for 12 hrs. However, BR is much further from the BC spillway...so I'm gonna have to side with TDSngumbo on this one.

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I’m sure if they opened ALL of them then maybe, perhaps, the stage in BR would lower by an inch or two but it’s mainly there to lower levels south of it.

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The break in the point was only draining the river for 12 hours and it lowered the gage 30 miles up river by 8 inches. The BCS can stay open because Lake Ponchatarian is not going to fill up in 12 hours. The Ms river is projected to rise at 4 inches per day right now the opening up the BCS to its design flow should halt the rise and start dropping the river by a few inches each day at Baton Rouge.

I wonder why.

They are stupid. Open the spillway now!

I'm sure they have a good reason but I just wish they would explain their reason!