Major post-flood recovery begins in Midwest
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Version 0 of 1. KINCAID, Ill. — The Mississippi River and many of its tributaries continued their retreat Sunday from historic and deadly winter flooding, leaving amid the silt a massive cleanup and recovery effort likely to take weeks if not months. The flood, fueled by more than 10 inches of rain over a three-day period that began Christmas Day, is blamed for at least 25 deaths in Illinois and Missouri, reflecting Sunday’s discovery of the body of a second teenager who drowned in central Illinois’ Christian County. The Mississippi River was receding except in the far southern tip of both states. The Meramec River, the St. Louis-area tributary of the Mississippi that caused so much damage last week, already was below flood stage in the hard-hit Missouri towns of Pacific and Eureka and dropping elsewhere. But worries surfaced anew Sunday along the still-rising Illinois River north of St. Louis, where crests near the west-central Illinois towns of Valley City, Meredosia, Beardstown and In Illinois’ Morgan County, home to the 1,000-resident village of Meredosia, locals were keeping wary eyes on levies fortified with 50,000 sandbags. As of midday Sunday at Meredosia, the Illinois was more than 10 feet above flood stage and pressing toward an expected crest Tuesday roughly a half-foot short of the record set in July. While optimistic those levies would hold, Jacksonville-Morgan County Emergency Management Director Phil McCarty said the prospect of flooding during the chill of winter carried dangerous health risks, including hypothermia. President Obama signed a federal emergency declaration Saturday for Missouri, allowing federal aid to be used to help state and local response efforts. It also allows the Federal Emergency Management Agency to coordinate disaster relief efforts. Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon had asked for the help. In Illinois’ St. Clair County just east of St. Louis, emergency management director Herb Simmons said damage assessment began Sunday after the Mississippi started to fall. Though water reached higher than 1993, this flood wasn’t as bad, he said. “In ’93, that water came up and stayed on the levees for several months,” Simmons said. “This flood came up quick and went down quick.” St. Louis area cleanup largely was focused around the Meramec. Two wastewater treatment plants were so damaged by the floodwaters that raw sewage spewed into the river. Hundreds of people were evacuated in the Missouri communities of Pacific, Eureka, Valley Park and Arnold, where many homes took in water. In southeast Missouri, up to 30 homes and several businesses were damaged in Cape Girardeau, a community of nearly 40,000 residents that is mostly protected by a flood wall. The Mississippi peaked at 48.9 feet Friday night, four-tenths of a foot above the 1993 record, but short of the 50-foot mark projected. Nearby levee breaks in other places kept the crest down. Amtrak service between St. Louis and Kansas City was back in business Sunday, four days after high water that reached the tracks at some locations forced the passenger service to be halted. — Associated Press |