- More than 2,250 barges sat idle final week till the river backside might be dredged.
- Those barges carry grains and uncooked supplies utilized in a variety of merchandise that would see costs improve.
- Salt water is flowing into the river from the Gulf of Mexico and affecting a group’s water provide.
Drought has pushed the Mississippi River to its lowest ranges in many years and that is affecting all the things from transport to ingesting water alongside the nation’s second-longest river.
The Mississippi is on the lowest stage George Flaggs has seen in nearly 70 years.
“It’s undoubtedly having an impression on the native economic system, as a result of the industrial use of this river has almost completely stopped,” Flaggs, the mayor of Vicksburg, Mississippi, informed WAPT-TV.
At Tiptonville, Tennessee, about 90 miles north of Memphis, the mighty river appears extra like a creek.
But the impacts will not be felt simply by folks dwelling and dealing alongside the two,350-mile-long river.
The Mississippi River Basin produces 92% of U.S. agricultural exportsand 78% of the world’s exports in feed grains and soybeans, in accordance with the National Park Service. Much of that’s shipped by barges, as are different merchandise like fertilizer, coal, oil and petroleum and metals.
For the previous couple of weeks, barges have been operating aground as a result of the river is so low. More than 2,250 barges sat idleclose to Vicksburg final week whereas ready for dredging to make the river deeper, Bloomberg reported.
That has brought on shippers to show to costlier rail and truck transport that may value 5 occasions as a lot as a barge cargo.
Higher transport prices for grains and fertilizers might result in increased meals prices in your native grocery retailer — at the same time as farmers who develop the meals are getting much less as a result of their harvest is piling up, in accordance with the University of Arkansas.
An improve within the value of metal might increase the price of a brand new automotive. A late coal cargo to an influence plant might trigger electrical energy to value extra. Even the value of a gallon of gasoline might rise as extra tractor-trailers take to the highways and improve demand.
“One 15-barge tow has the same freight capacity as 940 semi trucks,” Mike Steenhoek, executive director of the Soy Transportation Coalition, told Bloomberg.
And the effects could linger. Fertilizer that should be moving north on the river now to be applied in November isn’t moving.
“The biggest issue is planning for next year,” stated Hunter Biram, extension economist with the University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture. With fertilizer, “That value is already excessive and we don’t know but how a lot increased that would go.”
(WATCH: Near Record Lows In Mississippi River Causing Problems)
Meanwhile, more than 50 communities rely on the Mississippi for daily water supply, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.
The river’s low levels have caused a big problem for one of those communities.
Salt water from the Gulf of Mexico is able to move upstream into the river channelbecause of the lower, slower flow of the river, said David Ramirez, chief of the River Engineering Branch of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
Plaquemines Parish, which sits on the tip of Louisiana, has warned residents that the “saltwater wedge that’s shifting up the Mississippi River” is causing higher levels of sodium and chloride in the parish’s water supply.
Parish officials cautioned that the sodium and chloride could cause problems for people who are on dialysis or low-sodium diets because of health issues like high blood pressure or kidney diseases.
And it’s not just a health issue.
“The salt water can cause corrosion to pipes and can cause a change in the taste of the water for municipal use, so … that’s why we’re involved to mitigate that,” Ramirez told Fox 8 News.
The parish has secured two reverse osmosis machines, Plaquemines Parish President Kirk Lepine said in a news release.
“These plants will take out the chloride in the water and still produce approximately 1 million gallons of water for everyday use,” Lepine said.
To block the saltwater intrusion, the Engineers Corps will build an underwater levee at the bottom of the river, Ramirez said. It’ll be about 50 feet high and will use sediment dredged from the river. The construction may take about three weeks.
According to the U.S. Drought Monitor, much of the Mississippi River Basin is experiencing abnormally dry to severe drought conditions.
Some stretches of the river could flirt with record low levels later this month, including Caruthersville, Missouri; Osceola, Arkansas; and Greenville, Mississippi. At Memphis, the river could bottom out at levels not seen since the drought of 1988.
This September was among the 10 driest on record in Arkansas, Louisiana, Missouri and Oklahoma, according to NOAA.
Some welcomed rain fell Wednesday in the Lower Mississippi Valley, and more is on the way this weekend. But drier weather will return after that for at least the next week.
That all points to the situation not improving much as shippers race to make final shipments before the northern stretches of the river start to freeze.
“There’s always this race to get something unloaded in the northern areas – Iowa, Wisconsin, Minnesota — and have it back before the drawbridge closes behind you as a consequence of chilly climate and ice accumulation,” Steenhoek, of the Soy Transportation Coalition, informed Bloomberg. “That becomes all the more tricky when the river isn’t functioning as efficiently as normal.”
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