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The Intentional Flooding of America's Heartland

Posted by timothy on from the best-laid-dams dept.

Hugh Pickens writes "Joe Herring writes that sixty years ago, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers began the process of taming the Missouri by constructing massive dams at the top to moderate flow to the smaller dams below, generating electricity while providing desperately needed control of the river's devastating floods. But after about thirty years of operation, as the environmentalist movement gained strength throughout the seventies and eighties, the Corps received a great deal of pressure to include specific environmental concerns into their Master Water Control Manual, the 'bible' for the operation of the dam system, as preservation of habitat for at-risk bird and fish populations soon became a hot issue among the burgeoning environmental lobby. The Corps began to utilize the dam system to mimic the previous flow cycles of the original river, holding back large amounts of water upstream during the winter and early spring in order to release them rapidly as a spring pulse. 'Whether warned or not, the fact remains that had the Corps been true to its original mission of flood control, the dams would not have been full in preparation for a spring pulse,' writes Herring. 'The dams could further have easily handled the additional runoff without the need to inundate a sizable chunk of nine states.' The horrifying consequence is water rushing from the dams on the Missouri twice as fast as the highest previous releases on record while the levees that protect the cities and towns downstream were constructed to handle the flow rates promised at the time of the dam's construction."

5 of 477 comments (clear)

  1. Blaming environmentalists? by HangingChad · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Sen. Blunt characterized the current flooding as "entirely preventable" and told reporters that he intends to force changes to the plan.

    Given the volume of water the Corps is trying to manage, that statement is unbelievable hogwash. Ignorance that goes far beyond the people who try to argue "intelligent design" has a scientific basis. It reminds me of the attempts to blame poor neighborhoods for the mortgage crisis, even though the overall default rate in poor, minority neighborhoods was lower than upper-middle class white neighborhoods.

    Couldn't have anything to do with snow pack and rainfall being over double the norm, it's got to be those dang environmentalists.

    Using natural and man-made disasters to demigod your political opposition. We really have turned into a pathetic bunch. This tripe doesn't belong on Slashdot.

    --
    That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
    1. Re:Blaming environmentalists? by cptdondo · · Score: 5, Insightful

      The authors premise is that had the ACE not abided by various environmentalists requests to mimic the natural flow of the river, then they would have been ready for this huge influx of water.

      And if they don't mimic the natural flow, then the environment around the river changes, and deer come in and eat people's yards, and invasive plants take hold, and native fish disappear so you can't fish anymore, and the same idiots who scream about this would scream about that.

      You can't cure stupidity.

  2. trolling think tanks by jonpublic · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Hmm, the american thinker article seems pretty trollish, utilizing descriptions that I would generally find in political hate speech, blaming environmentalists for the flooding. The articles point isn't to find root cause, but to spread hate at environmental groups.

    A quick google search reveals that the american thinker is indeed a conservative online magazine. I would hope that folks realize there is a war of information out there between extremes of the political spectrum and that we are better off not spreading those words of hate. The extremists are always going to be looking to enlist you in their war, by claiming the other side is outrageous.

  3. Re:News Flash by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Move out of the flood zones or buy flood insurance. Its no different than the people that blamed the Army Corps when New Orleans flooded. Wake up people, you're living below sea level (New Orleans) or living in the 100 year flood plain (Midwest). What did you really think was going to happen?

    I live there, I have flood insurance. My insurance company wont cover a single cent because the flood is man made. Now what smart ass?

    Wait, wait. Insurance companies exclude acts of God AND acts of man? Doesn't that mean they never pay out...oooooh.

    The insurance business needs some serious fucking regulation.

  4. Re:Why should I read this? by chrb · · Score: 5, Insightful

    It's not the messenger, it's the message.

    It's a little hard to take seriously a message from a web site that argues that Hitler was a "green" and that "Nazi SS doctrine (was) an explosive concoction of eugenics and environmentalism loaded with eco-imperialistic ambitions that had devastating consequences on the Eastern Front in World War II." Seriously, what? The Nazi SS doctrine was environmentalism? Environmentalism and eco-imperialism were responsible for the Eastern Front in WWII? Crazy.