Posted
5/11/2011 09:25:00 PM
by Douglas
The record flooding on the upper Mississippi River is headed
for the, wait for it, LOWER Mississippi River. Sounds pretty logical, right? Well duh, but here's why it's a big deal to people
NOT just in the
Atchafalaya Basin:But the real threat posed by this historic, gathering flood may well lie several hundred miles to the south, where the Mississippi crosses the Louisiana border. There, as the Corps well knows but dare not discuss, this historic flood threatens to overwhelm one of the frailest defenses industrial humanity has offered to preserve its profits from the immutable processes of nature. This flood has the potential to be a mortal blow to the economy of the United States, and outside the Corp of Engineers virtually no one knows why.
Don't like $4 a gallon gas? Good, you won't have time to get used to it if the refineries between Baton Rouge and New Orleans are shut down because the course of the Mississippi changes course this weekend.
Well good luck with all that. For a good source of current events of as this unfolds, try
this. And
here's a great history of the problem, and 60 years of the Army Corps of Engineers trying to make water flow uphill.