There are 88 article(s) tagged Mississippi River:
“One of the first questions is going to be: if this water is essential to prosperity and growth, whose? Should it be those who dream about it in dry places, or those who are next to it?”
The National Weather Service at Memphis expects the river to approach, or maybe surpass, last year’s record low by the end of the month.
As demand for overnight river cruises on the Mississippi increases, the industry also faces increasing climate threats. Recent years have seen wild swings between heavy rainfall and severe drought, making the river tougher to navigate.
With the return of river travel, three companies are currently offering overnight cruises on the Mississippi while nearby cities look to cash in.
Overnight cruises returned to the Mississippi River a decade ago, and many passengers say the river’s storied past is part of the draw. But what history do they learn, and how?
The Great Plains Action Society’s Walk for River Rights was the centerpiece of a three-day summit last month for organizers from in the Mississippi River basin, who, among other things, want to grant the river legal standing.
Traffic is increasing, and the locks and dams have aged far past their life expectancy. They slow barges down, and shippers and commodity groups fear a breakdown on the horizon.
The new $22.5 million grader, delivered to its home port at Ensley Engineering Yard in Memphis in April, will service more than 950 miles of the lower Mississippi River, from Cairo, Illinois, to the gulf.
College students from nearly a dozen universities removed 75,000 pounds of trash from McKellar Lake in the past three weeks, intercepting it before it entered the Mississippi River.
Shelby County received $60 million for climate resilience projects in 2016 and work is ongoing in Raleigh, Frayser and Millington. A project along South Cypress Creek is just beginning.
Wetland depletion along the Mississippi River has left the region “exposed to disasters that would normally be absorbed by wetland capabilities,” the mayors said in their policy proposal.
The Army Corps is looking at a $50 million, 6,000-acre and 39-mile ecosystem restoration project beginning near Memphis.
A plume of chemical contaminants is traveling along the Ohio River at about one mile per hour and will eventually enter the Mississippi River.
Pumping water from the Mississippi River to drought-stricken western states is an option, but an expensive one.
Some of the “forever chemicals” that scientists have linked to various health risks were found at five locations along the Mississippi River in Louisiana at levels well above the EPA’s most recent guidance, according to a new report.
Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland said the program would help lower Mississippi River cities “become more disaster resilient” as the river emerges from a historic drought.
This fall’s drought could be a harbinger of challenges ahead for the Mississippi River shipping industry.
“No river in America’s maritime history has seen greater tragedy. And no drama on the Mississippi has been as dramatic, no tragedy as tragic, as what occurred right here.”
As half the country was in a drought — Lake Mead turning into Pond Mead and our own Mighty Mississippi becoming the Measly Mississippi — the ginkgoes didn’t turn yellow. Until they did.
A long-lasting La Niña is complicating the forecast. Right now, the country is preparing for its third consecutive year of La Niña — the first three-year La Niña in two decades.
Lotsa good news this week: The Tigers basketball team outdid Vanderbilt, The Lake District is taking off despite some setbacks, and record-low water in the Mississippi River creates a haven for treasure hunters.
“Most of us sort of live in our little world where everything is always the same. The leaves change, and the grass grows, but when a river drops like this … there’s a real sense of discovery — a sort of magic.”
The Mississippi River level is at a record-breaking low, and The Daily Memphian photographer Mark Weber captured images of the historic occasion.
“Low water can have as great a cost, or greater, than high water,” Strickland said. “We have all these tools at our disposal for floods, but very few for droughts.”
Drought conditions across much of the country continue to push the Mississippi River lower in Memphis, and weather officials say drier and hotter-than-average conditions will continue in the Southern U.S. this winter.