Posted on 05/03/2011 6:01:19 AM PDT by eak3
Last night, they blew the levees, flooding 200 square miles of Missouri farmland, and hoping to save Cairo, Illinois.
According to Mondays Southeast Missourian, flood levels in Cairo reached historic highs on Monday night when the gauge hit 61 feet, shattering old records set 74 years ago. In February 1937, the rivers rose to 59.5 feet in Cairo, Illinois. Think about that for a moment. This flood of 2011 is breaking all known records.
Its hoped that flooding the farms will spare the tiny town of Cairo, Illinois, population - 2,800.
(Excerpt) Read more at searshomes.org ...
Maybe I shouldnt be surprised but its kind of shocking I havent heard much about this at all.
Were the landowners justly compensated for the use of their land?
I don’t see why they would. Natural disasters happen, even when they’re man-made.
So, this was a “natural man-made disaster”?
:)
ping :(
I was taught that floods restore topsoil and make land more fertile
Now Obama is president, levees are being dynamited and it's no big deal.
I recognize that releasing water in one location may be the prudent choice, so I'm not criticizing this action to protect Cairo -- I just think it's amusing that most of what the Left hated Bush for, is also happening under Obama and it's not even considered worth talking about.
Gitmo, water-boarding, etc all fall into this category.
Yea, I think the word destroy is hyperbolic. No crop this year for sure though.
I’m wondering how much grain the country will produce this year.
As I understand it, some decades back they signed flood easements with the COE.
The problem, as I see it, is that this isn’t an ordinary flood. The amount of water that will be turned loose onto these lands will take them out of production for the entire growing season. It will take quite some time for some of them to even get their fields back into a land contour to use for planting again. There will be silt and cuts here and there, and a whole lot of earth will have to be pushed around... at $3.50+ diesel.
The flip side of this is the resentment at being used as the “escape valve” to “save” Cairo, IL, when anyone with an eye for what makes or breaks a community can look at Cairo and declare it a ghost town that hasn’t finished dying yet. And so, various policy makers inject racial politics into this and we’re where we are now...
Just read the whole story, looked and the pictures, and read the commentary. Very informative ... thanks!
The devastation of the AR area plus the economy and now Osama it keeps getting knocked off the front page. For the people living there believe me its the biggest story out there.
Besides, aside from Cairo and a few other places the majority of displaced don’t have the ethnic and financial disadvantages that the MSM loves to fawn over, especially when there isn’t a (R) in the top office.
This story says with all the sand and debris from the river bed being washed across this flood land it will be years before it can be used again.
Don’t the farmers live on their land? Won’t a flood take out their houses, barns, equipment, livestock? I’ve seen Cairo and what I saw was not worth saving, I think the wrong choice was made here. Go to the source and look at the photos at the end.
Im in agreement, looks like some hundred plus homes will be lost on top of the hundreds of square miles of productive farmland to save a dead town. I think the pics are really hit home the story here and we can see once again the politicans took the wrong side.
The farmers had a little warning I am sure but did they have enough to move out all their tools and equipment, not to mention the livestock that probably inhabits their property?
Hmmmn. Choice between photo-op Illinois (democrat/minority) voters in Cairo, or white productive farmers across the river who won’t vote for Obama ....
67% Holder’s people in Cairo, and shovel ready jobs nearby rebuilding the levee after the stormwaters recede is probably the Leftist’s target. It would seem from the track record of this Obama administration that would be in line with the their “thought processes”.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.