The 1993 Mississippi Flood Report.

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The 1993 Mississippi Flood Report

History

The Mississippi river is 3800km in length and flows through ten states. It receives over 100 major tributaries, including the Missouri which joins at St Louis. Its drainage basin covers one-third of the USA and a small part of Canada.

Frequent flooding by the Mississippi has created a wide flood plain. The flood plain is 200km wide at its widest point, and consists of fertile silt deposited by the river at times of flood. Even before the area was settled by Europeans, the river flowed above the level of its flood plain and between natural levees. Nineteenth-century Americans considered the Mississippi to untameable and a major flood in 1927 caused 217 deaths. Since then over 300 dams and storage reservoirs have been built, the natural levees have been heightened and strengthened to protect major urban areas. The levee at St Louis is 18km long and 16metres high. Flooding continued throughout the 1950’s and 60’s but the last big flood was in 1973. The American public believed that due to large investments of money and modern technology, they had at least ‘controlled’ the river. Certainly the danger to human life had been greatly reduced but that was before the events of the summer of ’93.

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 Events leading up to the flood

Heavy rain in April 1993 saturated the upper Mississippi basin. Thunderstorms throughout June caused huge surface run-off and lash floods. During July the thunderstorms increased in severity with one giving 180mm of rain in jut a few hours. By mid-July the level of the Mississippi had reached an all time high. Levees surrounding towns were put under a tremendous pressure from the weight of the water, in many places they collapsed. Away from the towns the river spread across its flood plain to a width of 25km. An area larger than the size of ...

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