Levee Breach Moves One Step Closer

 

“There are still a lot of decision points as we move forward,” Maj. Gen. Michael J. Walsh said Saturday, stressing that no final decision had been reached. “The system has never been under this type of pressure.”

For days now, General Walsh, the man charged with making the final call, has toured the area and huddled with experts as he has weighed this decision worthy of King Solomon: blast a two-mile breach into the levee at Birds Point, Mo., and inundate roughly 200 square miles of farmland and some 90 homes, or hold steady and risk drowning this once-proud city that is now struggling for survival along a narrow spit of land bounded by the surging Ohio and Mississippi Rivers.

Meanwhile, the rivers have continued to swell toward what analysts say will be historic levels, prompting Mayor Judson Childs of Cairo to issue a mandatory evacuation for this city of 3,000. The National Weather Service has forecast up to 5 inches of rain in coming days, leading corps analysts to warn that the river could stay at historic flood stages for more than five days.

“That sort of sustained crest puts an enormous amount of pressure on the entire system,” said Col. Vernie Reichling, the corps’ Memphis District commander, who has also led troops in Afghanistan. “It’s a very complex system. It’s a lot more difficult than just saying, ‘Go charge that hill.’?”

But while many residents in the area say they appreciate the intricacy of General Walsh’s decision, the situation has led to strained relations between Missouri farmers to the south, and residents of this majority African-American city marred by vacant buildings, drug abuse and poverty.

“Farmland over people? That’s ridiculous,” said Dorian Weems, 45, as he stuffed garbage into two overflowing trash cans outside his home near the flood wall. Mr. Weems, who said he was going to stay there as long as possible because he feared looters, added: “I think it’s a money thing. If Cairo gets flooded, they ain’t losing much — it’s just a bunch of low-income people there, so it doesn’t matter.”

Across the river in Missouri, Ellenann Howton said she feared her 90-acre spread would be “washed away” if the corps breached the Birds Point levee.

“I’ve cried. I’ve thrown up. I don’t eat because I’m so stressed,” said Ms. Howton, 59, who has lived on her land for 31 years and spent the past few days ferrying her valuables and more than 50 dogs and cats to safer ground. “I’m just sick-hearted about it. Why sacrifice one side for the other? I’ve never understood that.”

Missouri officials sued unsuccessfully last week to try to block the corps from flooding the cropland, a federally mandated flood way that is home to about 200 people. On Saturday, the Eighth Federal Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the lower court’s decision, clearing the way for the corps to move forward if necessary.

If General Walsh orders the levee breached, the two barges will pump explosives into an 11,000-foot system of pipes buried below the levee. A detonation crew will then blast the levee, allowing water to tear through the gap at an estimated 550,000 cubic feet per second, which they expect to drastically lower water levels upstream. Over the following 24 hours, the crew would blast two more holes in the levee downstream, allowing the water to re-enter the river.

“These are people’s homes, their livelihoods,” said Russ Davis, chief of the corps’ Operations Division. “We really don’t want to do this.”

The levee has been breached only once before, during the flood of 1937, and though officials in surrounding Mississippi County, Mo., say the majority of residents oppose breaching the levee, the situation is beyond their control.

“It’s going to take out one-third of my county — that’s a lot of good people with lots of history here,” said Sheriff Keith Moore of Mississippi County. “It’s going to be a tsunami for Mississippi County, but what I say isn’t going to make a difference. It’s one man’s call.”

Across the river, in the parking lot of an auto parts store in Cairo, a detail from the Illinois Army National Guard filled sandbags alongside a work crew from the Tamms Correctional Center, a state penitentiary 18 miles north of Cairo.

“If I had to choose, I’d have to go with life over land,” Mayor Childs said. “I wish I could flip a switch so the farmers would be happy and the citizens would be safe. Unfortunately, I can’t.”