Major river disruption only days away

River could drop to 6.1 feet by Sunday.

Major disruptions in Mississippi River barge traffic are only days away, the captain of a dredge working north of Cape Girardeau said Thursday.

On Friday the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers sent the dredge named the America to the Moccasin Springs area near Trail of Tears State Park to clear out the channel. The river has fallen due to the summer's drought.

The river gauge read 6.9 feet at Cape Girardeau late Thursday. Forecasts predict a fall to 6.1 feet by Sunday. The gauge is on the downtown riverfront. Gauge readings are based on a zero level set in early settlement days during periods of extremely low water.

"We are going to have a lot of trouble spots," Steve Pohlman, captain of the America said. "The corps is not going to have enough dredges to keep up."

Before coming to Cape Girardeau, the America had been operating at the mouth of the Kaskasia River. America is expected to be operating in the Trail of Tears area until Monday.

If water levels continue to fall, Pohlman said, the corps could order him to cut short his stay in the area to head for Ste. Genevieve, where bottlenecks are likely to occur.

Nicole Dalrymple, a spokesperson for the Corps of Engineers, said the dredging operations are done every year in August due to falling river levels and in anticipation of lower levels in the winter months, when flow reduces and the upper Mississippi ices over.

But with drought throughout the Mississippi River basin causing extremely low levels this year, dredging operations have been activated a couple of weeks earlier than usual.

"The low water is something everybody's watching very closely," said Dalrymple. "It's a whole regional issue."

Restrictions have already been placed on barge traffic on the Ohio River, and barges on the Mississippi have been forced to load smaller loads. Where barges usually run with 12-foot drafts, they're now running with 9- to 10-foot drafts.

The Coast Guard issues advisories and restrictions for vessels on the Mississippi River. So far no restrictions have been issued, but an advisory for lighter loads and keeping heavy barges in mid-channel has been issued. The Coast Guard has also encouraged any heavy barges to leave the river as soon as possible.

The Corps of Engineers, under federal law, must maintain a channel at least 9 feet deep and 300 feet wide for barge traffic.

"It's going to get really challenging in the next few months," said Dalrymple. An already shrunken river could be further reduced when the navigation season ends on the Missouri River, Dalrymple said. And winter ice on the upper reaches of the Mississippi could also cut flows.

But before those problems hit, the summer drought is controlling river flows. The river is already at or near record low levels in New Madrid, Mo., Tiptonville, Tenn., Caruthersville, Mo., and Helena, Ark. Over the next month, forecasters expect water levels to fall of two to three feet in water levels from St. Louis to Arkansas City, Ark.

That could force water levels below those seen in 1988, when stretches of the Mississippi became impassable.

"There are going to be major blockages, unless it is raining up above that I am not aware of," Pohlman said.

Long-range forecasts for the Cape Girardeau gauge predict a fall to 5.1 feet by the end of the month and continued low water afterward. Dalrymple said that level is a concern.

The record low in Cape Girardeau is 0.6 feet set in 1909. The modern low-water mark, set since the construction of dikes channel the river for barge traffic, was 1.29 feet in December 1989.

A stage of 5.1 feet in Cape Girardeau reaches the "low water reference point," said Dalrymple, a point where the water level is close to that minimum 9-feet deep required in the navigation channel.

And even with a few inches of rain, said Dalrymple, there probably won't be much rise in the river level because of the dry conditions.

msanders@semissourian.com

rkeller@semissourian.com