By BRENT MARTIN
St. Joseph Post
Most of the Missouri River system levees have been repaired from last year’s floods, but complications have arisen to delay the repair of some significant levees along the river.
Civil Engineer Geoffrey Henggeler with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Kansas City office says while finishing touches remain to be done, many levees from Holt County south along the Missouri River provide the protection they did before the 2019 floods heavily damaged them.
“Level of protection is in place for 39 of the 61 levees that have been approved for repairs,” Henggeler reports during a Corps conference call.
That phrase – level of protection – simply means the levees have been restored to the height prior to the damage left by last year’s floods. Not everything has been completed, though. Erosion from the floods must be repaired, side cover established, riprap replaced, and drainage structure repaired.
Two significant levees in northwest Missouri remain vulnerable to flooding. A major agricultural levee in Atchison County, suffering from five big scour holes, has yet to be repaired. And, it might take all summer to repair the Rushville levee, which protects Lewis and Clark Village as well as Highway 59 and access to the Missouri River bridge at Atchison, Kansas.
The Rushville levee cuts through wetlands, complicating repairs
Henggeler says land must be purchased before repairs can begin.
“There’s some coordination that they’re doing with the NRCS (USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service, which has an easement in an area where the levee is being proposed to be set back and the sponsor is coordinating that. The Corps of Engineers is participating in that as appropriate to finalize what the alignment of the repair will be.”
Repair of the levee will take a while.
“We hope that that would be under contract or at least advertised sometime this summer,” Henggeler says.
Civil Engineer Matt Krajewski with the Corps Omaha office says the Corps has made good progress on the levees damaged from Atchison County, Missouri north to Omaha.
“Thanks to a mild winter, we’ve made incredible progress restoring the levee systems along the Missouri River and its tributaries that were damaged in the 2019 flood,” Krajewski tells the conference call.
The Omaha District has jurisdiction over the Atchison County agricultural levee. Krajewski says the levee, which is on the mainstem of the Missouri River, suffered significant damage from last year’s floods. Right of way is being acquired.
Corps officials insist the Missouri River system is in better shape now than last year to handle any potential flooding this summer.