WOW! What a Vacation!!!

Pat and I flew to New Orleans Louisiana on May 19th to visit Pats family. We were picked up at the airport by Pats brother Bob and his sweet wife Martha Ann. Web went to a restaurant named Frostops, well known for it Frosty Root beer and great hamburgers.

We left there and headed to our first look at the flooding of the Mississippi River. We went to a levee called the Bonnet Carre Spillway. The information below the pictures will tell you all about the levee. You can see a post that shows 22ft of water, that is normally dry ground. The day that we were there the levee was flowing 316,000 cubic ft of water per second. The pictures will speak for them selves and the information will explain the reason it is open. The picture with Pat and Martha Ann is normally dry out to the Island. The picture on the right is actually the mighty Mississippi river.

The Bonnet Carré Spillway consists of two basic components: a control structure along the east bank of the Mississippi River and a floodway that transfers the diverted flood waters to the lake.The control structure is a mechanically controlled concrete weir which extends for over a mile and a half parallel to the river. When opened, the control structure slightly restricts the flow of the river (at the structure’s location) toward its main channel, thereby causing it to rise in elevation just high enough to flow into the diversion channel; and, with sufficient elevation (or head), to carry the overflow volume into Lake Pontchartrain. The lake’s opening to the gulf is sufficient to absorb and dissipate any conceivable volume of flood flow. Thus, the flood surcharge portion of the water from the Mississippi is divided between the main river and the diversion channel; with the surcharge bypassing the New Orleans metropolitan area, resulting in the Mississippi being lower (through that area) than it could have been; and reducing the stress on the area's levees that line the river. Confined by guide levees, the floodway stretches nearly six miles (10 km) to Lake Pontchartrain, with a design capacity of 250,000 cu ft/s (7,100 m3/s). The spillway is crossed by U.S. 61 and Interstate 10.
The spillway was built in response to the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927 that inundated much of the Mississippi River basin. It was first opened during the flood of 1937, and nine times thereafter through 2011 to lower river stages at New Orleans. The most recent opening began on May 9, 2011, when river levels in New Orleans approached the flood stage of 17 feet (5.2 m).

The spillway is part of the United States Army Corps of Engineers' multi-state plan, called the Mississippi River and Tributaries Project (MR&T), providing flood protection for the alluvial valley between Cape Girardeau, Missouri and the mouth of the river near Venice, Louisiana. Due to the wide expanse of the project and the complex problems involved, the plan contains an array of features. The MR&T Project provides for levees to contain flood flows, floodways such as the Bonnet Carré to redirect excess flows away from the Mississippi and has other aspects such as channel improvement and river bank stabilization for efficient navigation and protection of the levee system. It also involves reservoirs and pumping plants for flood control drainage.

This takes care on the first day that we were there as far as what we saw. I don't want to over whelm you with information so I will do one each day. I will have pictures of the flooding in the Morganza area and pictures of the tornado damage in Smithville Mississippi and Tuscaloosa Alabama. Being there and seeing the disaster was a lot different than seeing it on TV. We need to keep all the folks in our prayers as they try to restart their lives.

Be a Blessing to some one today and GOD BLESS you!

In God, whose word I praise— in God I trust and am not afraid. What can mere mortals do to me?” -Psalm 56:4