primitives discuss rampaging Missouri River

[franksolich]

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x1407216

Oh my.

proud2BlibKansan  (1000+ posts)        Sun Jul-03-11 11:01 AM
Original message
 
Rampaging Missouri River defies its master

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Now enough is barreling out of Lewis & Clark Lake to cover a football field 3½ feet deep every second. Water will race through the dam at that record rate, ultimately swamping farms and towns for hundreds of miles downstream, through August.

“When your bathtub is full, you just can’t put any more water in it,” said Dave Becker, the operations manager for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers at Gavins Point. “Water is going to spill over.”

But how did the bathtub get so full? Why did the six huge Missouri River reservoirs — Gavins Point is the farthest downstream — fill to the brim and force the months-long release of floodwater?

The short answer: The corps could have prevented or drastically held down flooding by opening flood gates sooner. The reasons it didn’t — reasons putting government water managers on the spot this summer — rest in a tangle of history, physics, meteorology and politics.

Read more: http://www.kansascity.com/2011/07/02/2990252/missouri-r...

MadHound  (1000+ posts)      Sun Jul-03-11 12:00 PM
Response to Original message
 
4. More Army Corp CYA

This has not been their most stellar year, first the flooding of the Mississippi, now this Missouri flooding.

Missouri has taken a huge hit this year from Army Corp ****-ups. Now they're talking about not rebuilding the Bird's Point levee this year 

Stay on high ground up there, I'm hoping that it's not going to be too bad down here.

proud2BlibKansan  (1000+ posts)        Sun Jul-03-11 12:29 PM
Response to Reply #4
 
6. We went down to the river last night to watch fireworks

It was as high as I'd seen it in years.

pscot  (1000+ posts)        Sun Jul-03-11 12:39 PM
Response to Reply #4
 
9. That's too harsh

The Corps can't control the weather. They're engineers, not sorcerers. Anyone who builds or farms in the flood plain is taking a chance, and they know it.

MadHound  (1000+ posts)      Sun Jul-03-11 12:44 PM
Response to Reply #9
 
10. No, they can't control the weather,

But their actions, when a problem is imminent or occurring have been disasterous.

They knew that this snow pack was going to be coming down the river, they should have started releasing it earlier.

They made the choice to save a fading river town at the expense of farmers in SE Missouri, and thus consigned those farmers to years of low/no crop yield. And further, they are potentially exposing those same farmers to further flooding next year.

Sorry, but the Army Corp has been a ****ed up operation for years and decades, and have cost this country lives and millions upon millions of dollars in damage.

pscot  (1000+ posts)        Sun Jul-03-11 01:04 PM
Response to Reply #10
 
11. I can't really defend the Corp

But I think you have to look beyond them. The river control systems have been shaped by years of conflicting political and economic demands. It's a system of tradeoffs. There was too much water this year and farmers got the short end of the stick.

MadHound  (1000+ posts)      Sun Jul-03-11 01:06 PM
Response to Reply #11
 
12. Well I understand that,

But the fact of the matter is that the Corp does whatever it damn well pleases, when it pleases. It could have cut through the political bullshit and said "No, we're doing this for the good of the people downstream" but they didn't.

The Corp has really screwed us this year, and we're going to be paying for it for years to come.

Well, I dunno.

My heart goes out to all decent and civilized people affected by the rising waters.

But if one's a primitive getting flooded, franksolich says "**** you.  Ha ha."

[JohnnyReb]

...and if the lake is to low to float DUmmies boat or generate electricity for his A/C, The Army Corp of Engineers screwed up again.

Drown the democ....uh....rats, problem solved.

[DumbAss Tanker]

I'm not the biggest fan of USACE (As the Corps is known in the green part of the Army), but it is rarely able to act on matters like this without Congressional meddling or even countermands, either directly from the delegations affected or at the behest of State governments making demands upon those delegations to get the Corps to do something (Or not do it) that the State has already been unsuccessful in obtaining by straightforward means. 

[tanstaafl]

Quote

MadHound  (1000+ posts)      Sun Jul-03-11 12:44 PM
Response to Reply #9
 
10. No, they can't control the weather,

But their actions, when a problem is imminent or occurring have been disasterous.

They knew that this snow pack was going to be coming down the river, they should have started releasing it earlier.

They made the choice to save a fading river town at the expense of farmers in SE Missouri, and thus consigned those farmers to years of low/no crop yield. And further, they are potentially exposing those same farmers to further flooding next year.

Sorry, but the Army Corp has been a ****ed up operation for years and decades, and have cost this country lives and millions upon millions of dollars in damage.

It still irks me that USACE blew the MO side levee to save that shantyville, Cairo IL.
Figured that Zero ordered it as the Missouri Delta folks are majority Repub voters and the white trash in Cairo vote Dem for the federal welfare checks

[jukin]

Record cold and snow fall for the winter of 2010/11 is why there is such flooding. Add in that the envirofascists have been stopping all reclamation projects and actually destroying some dams is yet another factor.

Liberalism is not just a mental disease it is evil.