Efforts to hold back Mississippi continue

WINFIELD, Mo. (AP) -- Along one of the last stretches of Mississippi River where the river is still rising, around-the-clock efforts continued Monday to keep floodwaters at bay.

Officials in Lincoln County asked for volunteers to fill 50,000 sandbags to fortify the 2-mile long Pin Oak levee, where pressure from the swollen Mississippi has softened the ground to the point where walking on the earthen berm is like "walking on a waterbed," said county emergency management spokesman Andy Binder.

A breach there would swamp 100 homes in east Winfield, as well as farm fields and a city ballpark. A muskrat that burrowed into the soft ground overnight created a geyser-like hole, and officials said it took nearly six hours to choke off the breach laying down plastic on the levee's river side.

"We've got a winning battle here, but we need to stay on top of it," said Jeff Stamper, a structural engineer with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

Only a handful of residents remained in town Monday, after emergency workers went door-to-door encouraging them to evacuate. Among the holdouts was Sherman Jones, 56, who was all alone in his house except for his dogs, Mugsy and Junior.

"There is no place to go but the high school. I am not going to leave 'til my feet are wet," he said. "It's been a rough year, but we'll get through it."

Elsewhere in the hard-hit county a few dozen miles north of St. Louis, National Guard soliders patrolled levees looking for soft spots. Downriver in Grafton, Ill., Mayor Richard Mosby said about 20 homes and businesses are flooded -- but no more should be affected if the Mississippi crests as forecast just a few inches above its current level.

The crest there and at Winfield was not expected until Thursday or Friday, according to the federal forecast issued Monday afternoon. In towns where the river has already crested, officials nervously stood watch Monday as they, too, waited on the water to drop.

Not far from the Iowa border, the river was down a few inches at Canton after cresting Sunday at 27 feet -- less than a foot under the record set during the Great Flood of '93. Jeff McReynolds, the city's emergency management director, said a voluntary evacuation request remained in place in the town of roughly 2,500.

McReynolds estimated as many as 500 residents were staying with relatives or friends outside of Canton, and he suggested they stay there for the time being.

"We were right up there to our nostrils for about 24 hours," McReynolds said. "The concern from our operations center is they (residents) have seen the crest, and think the river has come down and want to move back into their homes."

Illinois Emergency Management Agency officials said National Guard soldiers, prison inmates and others continued to sandbag the Sny levee, a 52-mile barrier near Quincy, Ill. Workers were also using a bulldozer to push the base of the levee higher, even as the river started to fall after cresting Monday.

Downriver from Quincy in Hannibal, Mo., the city's levee was doing a "superb job" holding back the slowing falling river from the boyhood hometown of Samuel Clemens, who wrote as Mark Twain. Marion County Emergency Management Director John Hark said the city was already planning ahead for its National Tom Sawyer Days, a well-known early July festival celebrating Twain's work.

With the flooding seemingly under control, Hark said perhaps he could try to figure out a way to lower gas prices so tourists could come to town for the celebration.

"The flood, I think, is easier," he said.

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Associated Press writers Betsy Taylor in St. Louis and Don Babwin in Chicago contributed to this report.