LA WhiteWater/ Morganza to Morgan City

[hdh]

http://www.wwltv.com/news/All-eyes-turn ... 72234.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Epic Flood when the Spillway opens!

http://www.mappingsupport.com/p/gmap4.p ... 9&label=on" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Cowper]

Saw in today's paper they have opened the first gate, expecting to open 3.

This is the area DeBo and I visited during the New Year's holiday; I wish we could run back to see the differences. I bet some of the places where we turned back due to low water are now a completely different and unrecognizable scene.

My heart goes out to the thousands of people (and millions of animals) that will be negatively impacted by this.

[Chester]

The Untold Story....
On April 17, 1973, I was there along the highway when they opened the Morganza Floodway gates for the first time ever. The amount of water and it's fury that poured thru was something to behold, and nothing I want to run. Both the La. Wildlife & Fisheries and Governor Edwards had pleaded to the Corps to open the gates gradually, giving time for the wildlife in the east part of the Atchafalaya Basin (some million acres or more) to get out. The Corps finally & reluctantly, agreed to open only 1/3 of the gates or about 40 of them the first day. But they stated they would have them all (120 gates?) opened within two more days, or by that Wednesday. That opening never happened, and probably never will.
Because the main E/W levees were not high enough (mis-engineered?), they barely contained the water that was released. Steel sheet pilings were driven and other repairs were scrambled into place on top of the rain drenched and now very soft main levees. If I remember right, gates were actually closed and not opened in the following days/weeks. Both the rise in water level, and resulting current in the swamp was much faster than projected by the Corp.
By boat, as a Spl. LW&F Agent, I assisted Regular LW&F Agents and personnel in retrieving deer and other animals swimming aimlessly in the now submerged fields, swamps, and gas/powerlines. Afterwards, as the water receded, animal skeletons up in the brush, trees, and elsewhere littered the landscape. We didn't have a GPS then, so we attempted to describe the few high spots where deer and other wildlife were congregated, so boats and a helicopter could make drops of feed corn.
The Corps learned a valuable lesson back then, so now you know why some 38 years later, the Corps spokeman proudly gave news interviews with only 1 ONE gate opened the first day.

Below is a Razorback, caught on a raised road bed as the water receded; a deer skeleton; and a shot looking south at the Atchafalaya River levee off the bridge at Krotz Springs, LA. I have original Morning Advocate/StateTimes Baton Rouge newspaper clippings, but they are probably copyrighted material so I didn't post them.

[hdh]

Charlie Fryling, of Friends of the Atchafalaya Basin, said he's concerned about wildlife in the Basin trying to escape flooding in the Morgan City-Pierre Part area where steel coffer dams have been hammered into the top of the Atchafalaya levee to raise it.

"There's no way they could get out," he said. The state "could build a ramp" of dirt and wood so creatures could get out without water topping the levee.

Hope they found a solution..


also saw this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQNNNA2VCHE" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[RandyJ]

also saw this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQNNNA2VCHE" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I watched that. Believe I saw a keeper hole or two in there.

[hdh]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3X-lOaCwauA" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

looks rowdy!
roman, dangerBoy,Willard,goodwin trio, anyone? ,anyone?

[hdh]