Residents of southern states along the Mississippi river are braced for the flooding that has swamped communities in Illinois and Missouri over the last week, causing thousands of evacuations and killing at least 29 people.
Officials in Louisiana are checking levees daily, and Exxon Mobil has decided to shut its 340,571 barrel-per-day refined products terminal in Memphis, Tennessee, as floodwaters threatened to inundate the facility just south of the city’s downtown.
“All that water’s coming south and we have to be ready for it,” Louisiana lieutenant governor-elect Billy Nungesser told CNN. “It’s a serious concern. It’s early in the season. We usually don’t see this until much later.”
Workers in Tennessee were preparing for the Mississippi in Memphis to reach flood stage over the weekend.
“We’re moving things up high and we’ve got our generators out and got some extra water,” said Dotty Kirkendoll, a clerk at Riverside Park Marina on McKellar Lake, which feeds off the Mississippi.
Flooding in the US midwest typically occurs in the spring as snowmelt swells rivers. Freezing weather in the region has added to the challenges as the waters have slowly started to recede from the St Louis area.
Most of the deaths from the rare winter floods have been caused by people driving into flooded areas after days of downpours. Two teenagers remain missing in southern Illinois after their truck was recovered late on Thursday night.
Twelve Illinois counties have been declared disaster areas, and governor Bruce Rauner on Friday ordered Illinois National Guard troops into flooded areas in the southern part of the state to mitigate flood damage and help with evacuation efforts.
The Mississippi is expected to crest at Thebes, in southern Illinois, at 47.5 feet (14 metres) on Sunday, more than 1-1/2 feet above the 1995 record, the National Weather Service (NWS) forecast.
Flood warnings were also in effect on Friday for parts of Texas, Oklahoma, the Carolinas, Alabama and Kentucky, the NWS said, while major flooding was occurring on the Arkansas river and its tributaries in that state.
Dozens have died in US storms, which also brought unusual winter tornadoes and were part of a wild worldwide weather system over the Christmas holiday period that also saw severe flooding in Britain.
More than 100,000 people were forced to evacuate their homes in areas borderingParaguay, Uruguay, Brazil and Argentina after floods due to heavy summer rains caused by El Niño, authorities have said.
Particularly hard hit in the United States in recent days has been Missouri, which has suffered historic flooding.
Close to St Louis on Friday, the Mississippi, the second-longest river in the United States, was falling after reaching near-record heights, the NWS said.
The Meramec river, which meanders near St Louis and empties into the Mississippi, broke height records on Thursday, sending a deluge of water over its banks and forcing the closure of two major highways.
Interstates 55 and 44 reopened on Friday, but many other roads remained closed in the St Louis area, state officials said, causing extreme traffic congestion.
Thousands of people evacuated from their homes earlier in the week were waiting to return to their communities and begin the process of cleaning up. Hundreds of structures have been damaged or destroyed, local officials said.
These people on the banks of the Mississippi amaze me with their stupidity for entering into 30 year mortgages on the bank of a river that’s expected to flood every twenty years, especially when they can’t even get flood insurance because of their location.
Now, I understand the importance for commerce and jobs to be near that river, but don’t you think that by now someone would have the sense to build their house on stilts, as has been successfully done all over the planet in areas subject to flooding?
The long stoops extending to the second floor of a house that Brooklyn is famous for are actually remnants of Dutch architecture. (you might remember the story of the Dutch kid with his finger in the dike. That dike wasn’t human. It was a levee that kept the river out). Well they gave us one perfect example of how you can live in an area that’s subject to regular flooding, without seeing your home washed away with the tide.
You would think that SOMEONE living on the banks of the Mississippi might learn from this example, but instead, the morons stand there scratching their empty heads when their house get flooded, again, and again. And we’ll see them all on the news again, and again, crying about how they “lost everything in the flood”, when anyone with a brain in their head could have seen the flood coming two decades in advance.
Build your house OFF THE GROUND when you know the ground is going to be washed away before the house is even paid for, you mental midget.
See the two idiots in the row boat (photo)? In a few days they’ll be tearing up carpets, and replacing sub floors because they had no idea that the Mississippi might someday rise.
JR i agree with you 100 %. we built in 73. I chose the highest place i could find. I have watched people settle in flood plains for years. I know people who have camps along the river having to gut and redo every so often. I cant understand how someone can justify building that way. I have marveled at that for a long time.
in 93 people lost everything they had, and went back and built back in the same place. STUPID!!
I’m glad you seized the high ground, Paul. That was wise.
But do you see my frustration with these people? They don’t even have to invent anything new. People have been living in flood zones forever…without losing everything they own.
They only need to employ building techniques suitable for their area, but they refuse to. It’s as if they enjoy the misery.
“Moms comin’ round to put it back the way it aught to be”
Now they need a -25degree 80mph wind storm followed by 2, 95degree days.
“extreme fluctuation in temperatures have been know to crack pipes, crack pipes,,,
crack pipes”