Low-high, high-low: Mississippi flooded in spring, but now levels are falling and barge traffic could be slowed again

Just below the confluence with the Ohio River, a barge loaded with coal and gravel found the channel close to the Kentucky shore of the low Mississippi River last Friday as the Missouri shore grew more sandy. (Rural Blog photo by Al Cross)

Life on the Mississippi is getting drier as the river faces drought and dipping levels. Low water is "threatening to disrupt commerce for a second consecutive year, months after cities along the vital economic artery saw floodwaters test their sandbag barriers and containment walls," reports Shannon Najmabadi of The Wall Street Journal. "Water levels in St. Louis and Memphis are 10 to 20 feet lower at this point in the year than in 2020 and 2019 due to lack of rain. Parched soils have absorbed moisture instead of letting it run off into the river, though recent downpours have helped, said Lisa Parker, spokeswoman for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' Mississippi Valley Division."

Over half of U.S. soybeans are exported, and most of that goes down the Mississippi, Najmabadi notes. Mike Steenhoek, executive director of the Soy Transportation Coalition, "said the Army Corps of Engineers has begun monitoring water levels and has 16 dredges operating on the Mississippi River to keep the water channel and harbors deep enough for transit. Steenhoek told the Journal, "We've really seen this ebb and flow—this dramatic ebb and flow—this last year more than we've seen in years past."

Part of spring's water highs stemmed from Minnesota's record snowfall melting in April, its runoff engorging the river, but it is increasingly plagued by droughts. "Low water levels on the Mississippi River last fall contributed to $20 billion in economic losses, according to an AccuWeather estimate. Some barges were grounded on sandbars," Najmabadi reports. "Other vessels lightened their loads to keep them from sitting too low in the water, which increased transportation costs for farmers and others."

The river's fluctuating levels are affected by weather and changing climate, but the river is engineered by humans. Nicholas Pinter, a University of California professor who has extensively researched rivers and watersheds, told Najambadi, "Climate change is in there. . . . [But] it's smaller than the impacts of levees and navigational infrastructure on portions of the Mississippi River."

Bob Criss, a professor emeritus at Washington University in St. Louis and "critic of the Corps' management of the river, said U.S. goods should also be moved by rail," Najambadi reports. "Because locks and dams used to make the Mississippi River navigable create a slow-moving, deep channel that has changed the environment." Criss told her: "The Mississippi River from St. Louis all the way to New Orleans was twice as wide as it is now. It was full of islands and sandbars, which are habitats for birds and everything else. The barges do not pay for the river maintenance. . . . They pay nothing for the dredging."

Tracy Zea, president and chief executive officer of the Waterways Council, which represents river shipping interests, "is hopeful water levels won't be as low as last fall," Najambadi writes. "About 500 million tons of goods, worth more than $158 billion, are transported on inland U.S. waterways each year, Zea said. The vessels are more fuel-efficient than trucks or trains. One barge can carry the load of 70 fully loaded semi-trucks."