TULSA, Okla. — The 3,000 electronic games and gaming tables are silent at the River Spirit Casino Resort as the water encroaches, idling more than 1,500 employees in an eerie scene threatening to repeat itself in flood-soaked communities across the Midwest and the Great Plains.The 200,000-square-foot gambling mecca has been closed since the Arkansas River began flooding last week, and it's The casino's pool bar is under water, which has even entered its famed tiki bar, the resort said. The Army Corps has been fully engaged in a "flood fight" for eight months and has been activated for flood response for nearly a year.
"We've already identified over $2 million in damage just on infrastructure repairs to our streets and water systems," Craft said, stretching his small city's budget past the breaking point.Along the mainstem Mississippi, damages already exceed $2 billion, according to estimates from insurers provided to the Mississippi River Cities and Towns Initiative. To measure the scope of the spring floods, The New York Times analyzed satellite data from the Joint Polar Satellite System using software, developed by government and academic researchers for flood detection, that is frequently used in disaster response. "The river is still having a release out of the dam that’s highest than it’s been in over three decades, we still have a long way to go before we’re in a safe pace in this community," he said. "This is a very catastrophic, not-yet-over scenario that we're dealing with," Rep. Steve Womack, R-Ark., said.At the tip of the peninsula formed by the confluence of the Missouri and the Mississippi rivers in Missouri, the Rivers Pointe Fire Protection District told residents of Portage Des Sioux and West Alton to evacuate as the Mississippi crests. Rivers are already in flood stage or running high in parts of the Midwest.
"We have a volunteer cleanup every year, but this is going to take major volunteers. The flooding started in earnest in March as heavy rains fell on frozen ground already bearing a deep load of winter snow. Top of Page. Explore our digital archive back to 1845, including articles by more than 150 Nobel Prize winners.© 2020 Scientific American, a Division of Springer Nature America, Inc.Support our award-winning coverage of advances in science & technology.Subscribers get more award-winning coverage of advances in science & technology.Scientific American is part of Springer Nature, which owns or has commercial relations with thousands of scientific publications (many of them can be found at
The news and stories that matter, delivered weekday mornings.Let our news meet your inbox. Prepare for flooding For communities, companies, or water and wastewater facilities: Prepare for flooding; During flooding; Recovery after flooding; Midwest Floods of 2019.
"I've been here 5½ years, and I've been through two 50-year floods," Mark Newlin of Portage De Sioux told One death has been confirmed in Iowa, that of an unidentified person in the town of Adair, near Des Moines, authorities said.
For the Midwest, Epic Flooding Is the Face of Climate Change. "One minute you're driving, and the next second you're on your side sliding down the interstate," Sgt. “This is a year that will remain in our cultural memory, in our history,” he said. ""This is a very catastrophic, not-yet-over scenario that we're dealing with," a lawmaker says as historic floods threaten to worsen.Get breaking news alerts and special reports. It will then begin to reduce the magnitude of that release, he said. "As it stands, the river needs to drop an additional 4 feet to open Grafton's main street — the "Great River Road" — by the July 4 holiday.Jared Gartman, chief of readiness and contingency operations for the Army Corps of Engineers' Mississippi Valley Division in Vicksburg, Miss., said most of the Army Corps districts in the basin have broken records for flood duration, in some places by weeks, and roughly 30 levees have been overtopped or breached in the lower basin.High water along the Mississippi, particularly in the New Orleans district, has exceeded levels seen during the Great Flood of 1927, one of the worst natural disasters in U.S. history. People living along two lakes and a river in mid-Michigan rushed to evacuate Tuesday after the breach of a dam following days of heavy flooding across parts of the Midwest… Bynum said at the news conference. But flooding that unfolds over months across a broad area has a harder time breaking through. Ultimately, the volume of water is only one source of damage: What’s in that water also plays a role. By the end of June, the flooding was so intense and widespread that at least 11 states had sought federal disaster funds for more than 400 counties. Updated at 6:41 a.m. "That gives you testimony of the duration of this flood. Severe flooding throughout the Midwest—which triggered a delayed growing season for crops in the region—led to a reduction of 100 million metric tons of net carbon uptake during June and July of 2019, according to a new study. It is only when seen as a single, connected event that the stunning scale of the 2019 flood season becomes clear. "In ordinary years, we are generally able to operate toward to the middle to end of March," he said.
Warmer air can hold more moisture, and that moisture can fall back out of the sky, whether as rain or snow, in greater amounts.
But when he returned home in the afternoon, water "was coming in my doors.
"In Casey, about 25 miles west of Des Moines, winds associated with the storm were so fierce that they flipped over four semitrailers on Interstate 80 on Tuesday morning. Communities that have seen little rain are getting hit by historic flooding along the Arkansas River thanks to downpours upstream. "Bynum warned that despite the night of better weather, there was still work to be done and residents should "remain vigilant" and while there was no emergency in regards to the levees at the moment, "there is high risk.