WHERE WILL IT END?: SWOLLEN RIVER WON'T SPILL OUT SOUTH OF CAIRO

While floodwaters ravage homes, businesses and farms along the Mississippi River north of Cairo, Ill., cities to the south will remain dry.

Caruthersville is the only city south of Cairo predicted to have a flood crest above flood stage but just by 1 foot. At New Madrid, farmers are worried about losing their crops not to flooding but to drought.

The flooding ends at Cairo, where the Mississippi changes from the upper Mississippi to the lower Mississippi.

Bill Schult, a spokesman for the Army Corps of Engineers in Memphis, said the Mississippi River changes form at that point.

"When the upper Mississippi hits the Cairo area, the Mississippi becomes much wider and much deeper," Schult said.

"It's just a natural phenomenon. We have areas as deep as 120 feet, and you know how much wider it is there. The river can accept those flows and dissipate that water.

"It's like taking a garden hose and filling a bathtub," he said.

In addition, he said, the Ohio River is not at the same flood level as the upper Mississippi River, and is not expected to reach that level. The Corps says the lower Mississippi is capable of handling twice the volume of water it is now receiving from the upper Mississippi.

Bob Anderson, a spokesman for the Corp of Engineers in St. Louis, used another analogy to the Mississippi River above and below Cairo. "It turns from a two-lane backroad to an eight-lane superhighway," he said.

The only flooding expected below Cairo is in lowlands between levees and the river.

"Those people who farm those areas expect it to flood," Schult said.

Caruthersville is the only city along the Mississippi south of Cairo where the river is predicted to crest above flood stage. On Sunday the river should crest at 33 feet, there.

Had the Ohio River been running high along with the Mississippi, that would not be the case, said Ken Ladd, area engineer for the Memphis district of the Corps. Ladd is in charge of the Caruthersville office.

He said the water would have begun backing up toward Caruthersville and northward had the Ohio been full. "Now it's got a place to run," he said.

The Ohio contributes 70 percent of the water in the lower Mississippi, Ladd said.

Wilma House of the Caruthersville Chamber of Commerce said 1 foot over flood stage will have virtually no impact on that city.

"The river is up higher than usual," House said. "But at 33 feet it will just barely be up to the bank, not even over."

Caruthersville has a floodwall and levee system to protect it from the river. The river bank is quite a distance from the wall, she explained.

Water rises at Caruthersville nearly every spring. "But rarely does it come up to the wall," she said.

"I do feel sorry for all those people up north," House said.

At New Madrid, the river is scheduled to crest Saturday 1 foot below flood stage of 34 feet.

While farmers to the north watch their crops wash away, farmers near New Madrid are irrigating fields, hoping to save crops threatened by drought.

Angie Holtzhouser, director of the New Madrid Chamber of Commerce, said it's curious that cities along the same river face such different scenarios.

"We muse over that point now and then and we always say thank you."

New Madrid has seen it's share of flooding over the years.

"We have a lot of sympathy for those folks," she said. "This just happens to be one of the few times we are not affected. We have definitely over the years had our share of it.

"Only the bottomland adjacent to the river has any water at all," said Holtzhouser.

"Some farmers have taken some precautions: built some sandbag levees just in case," Holtzhouser said.

"Nobody is taking it lightly," she said. "We understand the river very well and respect it highly."

At Memphis, the river is slated to crest July 27 at 6 feet below flood stage.

The situation is the same at Greenville, Miss., 5 feet below; Vicksburg, 6.5 feet below; Baton Rouge, 4 feet below; and New Orleans, 5 feet below.