MISSISSIPPI RIVER LOWEST IN 20 YEARS - The New York Times

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By Wayne King Special to The New York Times

• Sept. 16, 1976

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September 16, 1976

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MEMPHIS, Tenn., Sept. 15—The drought‐starved Mississippi River a major inland waterway, has ebbed to its lowest point in 20 years in the last month, spawning a rash of groundings, dangerous barge breakaways and costly delays just as the river moves into its period of heaviest traffic.

The Army Corps of Engineers has declared a state of “emergency‐type operations” along a 400 mile stretch of the river north and south of Memphis, the stretch considered the most difficult to navigate in periods of low water. The corps reports that six to eight barges run agrovnd each day, compared to one week in normal times.

“We've got deep serious problems,” said Col. Robert W. Lockridge, district engineer for the Memphis region, the area with the most serious problems. “Well, not deep, and that's the problem. And we're not even into the dry season. That's just beginning, normally it's at its worst in December, a little in November.

The water level gage at Memphis registered minus 4.7 feet today, meaning the river is that far below what is considered normal. Yesterday the gage registered five feet below normal, just inches below the record of minus 5.4 feet registered in the dry season of 1956.

“I have no doubt at all we'll reach that figure, based on the forecasts, within the next few days, by next Sunday,” Colonel Lockridge said.

Nine‐Foot Channel Required

Barge operators are operating with limited loads, down to half what is normal, in some cases offloading onto shore for transport by truck around the worst sections of the river, adding millions of dollars to the cumulative cost of important products, such as grain, petroleum and steel.

“This low water this time of year very very unusual,” said Colonel Lockridge. “We just don't have the water we should.

The Corps is required to maintain channel nine feet deep and 300 feet wide at a minimum.

This is necessary because most fully loaded barges need the depth to clear bottom. The width is necessary because maneuverability is needed to follow the deepest channel, avoiding shifting sandbars on the bottom. The barges normally move on the river in “tows” —a number of barges lashed together with steel cables and moved from behind by a large, blunt‐nosed tug.

Now Employed Fewer Barges

A tow in normal times may have six or seven barges across and about eight deep. However, shippers are now using fewer barges in a tow to decrease maneuvering room needed in narrow, shallow channels.

“The worst problem is when you have a tow break up,” said a corps official. “What happens is that a tow, a cluster of barges, will run up on a sandbar that just shifted into being and if the wrench is strong enough, it will break apart, the cables snap—and then you have a barge loaded with maybe 1,500 tons of steel floating out of control it can flip over, ram a bridge, anything. We have'nt had any flip over, but a number have broken in the last month, sometimes one a day.

Colonel Lockridge said that in the 400 mile stretch of river in the Memphis region, from Cairo, III. to Vicksburg, Miss., there were 19 sections now regarded as “dangerous” because of low water.

The company, he said, still has to pay the normal rate for each barge, fully loaded or not, thus its shipping costs are double.

Fewer Problems at St. Louis

To the north, in the St. Louis region, Col. Lee McKinney of the Corps of Engineers reported, “some grounding,” but generally fewer problems than in the Memphis region, though “we're getting about half the water flow we normally get this time of year.

“We're coming into the heaviest time for shipping,” he said. “October is our heaviest month, when the grain goes south and fuel —coal and oil —for the winter heating, picks up going north in both regions, along some 700 miles of the river, the corps is using its available dredges, as well as those contracted from private companies, to clear sand bars that pop up because of silting and shifting of the bottom. “We're using the dredges to put our fires,” Colonel McKinney said. However, he added, the river in his region could drop three feet or more without creating extreme hazards.

In Memphis, however, Colonel Lotkridge said that if the river dropped to below minus 5.4 on the gage, “we'll be in totally new territory. It's never been below that before.