The potential flooding is the result of heavy rains last month in the Midwest.
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Thursday, the river was near its expected crest and the threat appears to be subsiding.
Morganza isn’t likely to be opened in the next 10 days, Hansen said. Built after the great river flood of 1927 as a flood-relief valve, it pulls water from the river into a 5.7-mile floodway that empties into Lake Pontchartrain and, eventually, the Gulf of Mexico.
The spillway is opened when the river flow reaches 1.25 million cubic feet per second.
On Sunday, the Corps is opening the Bonnet Carre spillway in St. John The Baptist and St. Charles Parishes upriver from New Orleans. As a further precaution, any construction projects within 1,500 feet of the river also were shut down. At that level, buildings on the riverside of the protection walls in Morgan City and Berwick will be under water and restrictions to river traffic will be in place, according to the National Weather Service.
Hansen, “There are no differences in the physical operation of the spillway – but there are differences in the way the river behaves or performs…When there’s less vegetation along the riverbanks and the batture…the river is a little more efficient in moving water at any given stage”.
Col. Richard Hansen, commander of the corps’ New Orleans District office, said 20 bays would be opened on Sunday, each containing 20 needles, which will allow 12,000 cubic feet per second of water to enter the spillway, added to the 8,000 cubic feet per second leaking between the needles in the other bays and into the spillway. The Mississippi, Meramac and Missouri rivers reached near-record heights in Midwestern cities. “We have seen pretty much the worst of it”, he said.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers will continue to monitor the levees until after the crest, when the water begins to recede.
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Even though the Mississippi River flooding was enough to close Greenbelt Park this week, the corps said it is watching. The agency “stands ready to assist our local partners in any way necessary to get through this event”.
