Break Out The Sandbags

The Mississippi River originates at Lake Itasca, Minnesota and winds 2,300 miles to empty into the Gulf of Mexico below New Orleans.  It's our nation's largest river system; it and its tributaries drain the heartland of America, from the Appalachians to the Rockies.  I've heard it described as a stinking, muddy ditch.  To me, the river is majestic and beautiful.  I've never watched her transverse our great country without seeing Huck Finn in my mind's eye, without picturing the brave pioneers who crossed her width on their way to all points west, without realizing how integral this river is to our commerce and our food supply.

The delta areas of the Mississippi are a sea of green in the spring and summer.  Corn, soybeans, rice, and cotton are among the thousands upon thousands of acres of agricultural acreage bordering the river and its tributaries.  It's a sight to behold, and a sobering reminder of how much of our nation's bountiful cornucopia is harvested from this region,

Today, the communities along the Mississippi are preparing for flooding not seen since 1927.  The rain over past few weeks has been torrential and unrelenting in many places that drain into the Mississippi basin.  Here is a current photo of the Mississippi River north of Cairo, Illinois:

If you look closely, you can see the barges in the main channel.  All the rest of that water is flooding. 

Cairo, Illinois is where the great Ohio River flows into the Mississippi; it's the most amazing confluence I've ever seen.  The Mississippi is a brown, muddy river, and the Ohio is blue.  For miles downstream of the confluence, the river is divided into a bi-color spectacle as if delineated with a ruler and a pencil.  Here's a current picture of the Ohio River:

Yep, that guy is standing on his deck.  All this water will be joining the waters of the Mississippi, and it will roar downstream.

The dams along the White River in Missouri and Arkansas are straining under the workload; Table Rock Dam (one of 8 dams along the White) is holding record amounts of runoff, and when they can't handle the increased capacity through their turbines,  the floodgates will be opened.  The White River flows into the Arkansas River, which flows into the Mississippi. 

With grocery prices already sky-high and our national resources strained to the breaking point, let's hope the levees hold.

More here and here.