NEW ORLEANS (AP) — The Army Corps of Engineers' New Orleans District commander said Tuesday that he's confident the high Mississippi River will pass safely through Louisiana to the Gulf of Mexico.
Col. Rick Hansen said he will recommend opening the Bonnet Carre Spillway, possibly as early as Saturday, to divert river water into Lake Pontchartrain.
He said he'll be meeting this week with people who could be affected by opening the Morganza Floodway. Those meetings will be held Thursday and Friday in Morganza, Butte La Rose and Morgan City.
The Bonnet Carre Spillway has been opened 10 times, most recently during the record floods of 2011. Corps officials said Saturday would mark the earliest opening.
Opening the spillway always brings a crowd, Hansen said, and he asked people to keep safety in mind. "Stay out of the water," he said, noting that in the past the Corps has had to order kayakers and people on powered personal watercraft out of the water.
The Bonnet Carre is opened if water is flowing at 1.25 million cubic feet per second — enough to fill the Superdome in a minute and 40 seconds.
Asked about the flow rate, Hansen gestured to the river behind him, which was up to 14 feet Tuesday, and said it was moving at about 1 million cubic feet per second.
The Morganza Spillway is opened if the river is at least 57 feet high at Morganza and rising, and 1.5 million cubic feet of water is flowing every second. That would fill the Superdome in less than 84 seconds.
Morganza isn't likely to be opened in the next 10 days, Hansen said. He said the Corps bases its decisions on the National Weather Service's 10-day forecasts, and the river isn't expected to get that high and fast in that time.
– by AP Reporter Janet McConnaughey
