Re: Oil Rig explosion/Gulf Oil Spill Actually, it won't. Not even when the Mississippi changes course at Morganza. That's a 70-foot deep channel and New Orleans is at sea level, Baton Rouge is only at 15-20 feet. Both will be on a very long thin, but still quite deep estuary. Even better, it will have a constant level with no spring flood. And being free of sediment, will not require the constant dredging to keep open channels at the crossovers. New Orleans would see no apparent change in water level or river width. Baton Rouge would see a lower water level on a still very wide and deep channel. Salt water will come up as far as Baton Rouge in the lower channel. The only remaining tributary below Morganza is Thompson's Creek to introduce fresh water (not much). The Mississippi River would go by Krotz Springs and Morgan City, while Baton Rouge and New Orleans would be on Thompson's Creek!
Re: Oil Rig explosion/Gulf Oil Spill that's good to know. i always thought that br and nola would be left without the ports they have now which would destroy both cities, imo. but its not a matter of if, its a matter of when, i agree. the corps is not gonna be able to control old river forever. they have come close to losing it before and it will happen. when is the only question. as a side note, i always thought it was ironic that in nola the offices for the army corps of engineers are on leake avenue. fitting.
Re: Oil Rig explosion/Gulf Oil Spill Ask this question again at the end of July when this thing is finally capped...
Re: Oil Rig explosion/Gulf Oil Spill from what I hear, the lawsuits have been continuously rolling in. BP ain't done. they profited over $200 billion last year. PROFIT. plus, these fisherman will never get what they actually make in return from BP. to prove amount of lost income, they're gonna use past tax returns. a lot of these guys make some serious jack in cash deals, and never claim how much they actually make. they may bring home between 70k-100k. but on their tax returns, they'll only show 25k. So as far as BP is concerned (and Uncle Sam for that matter), the guy only made 25k. BP will only be responsible for what these guys claim yearly. then you also will have people like my dad's neighbor. dude bought and repaired a shrimp boat. this was gonna be his 1st season as a professional shrimper. he has no tax returns to show what he would normally make, because he's never done it before. Yet it is still gonna be a lost income.
Re: Oil Rig explosion/Gulf Oil Spill I have heard many people speak of this. To be honest, I have no sympathy for those guilty of tax evasion.
Re: Oil Rig explosion/Gulf Oil Spill kinda how I feel. if they had claimed what they actually made, they would get that much as compensation by BP. the fun part will be if they try to fight BP for more. can't wait to hear a court room conversation something like this: fisherman: "your honor, I made $125,000 last season" Judge: "your tax return says you made $18,500" fish: "that's not everything, I made a lot more in cash" judge: "thanks. you now owe a sh!t pot in back taxes"
Re: Oil Rig explosion/Gulf Oil Spill I wonder if there are a lot of ammended returns being filed right now.
Re: Oil Rig explosion/Gulf Oil Spill doubtful. the amount that would be owed in back taxes would be pretty substantial.
Re: Oil Rig explosion/Gulf Oil Spill Lots. And the state and federal government should start making long-range plans. Fortunately the Atchafalaya Basin is largely a roadless wetland and sparsely settled. Morgan City might be history, though. The basin is already infilling rapidly just from the Red and Atchafalaya sediments and it would continue with the Mississippi/Missouri/Ohio sediments reaching it. The familiar backswamps will become natural levees around the new river course and create what will become almost inexhaustibly fertile croplands like those along the modern and the old Lafourche and Bayou Tech courses of the the River. Most of the human impact of the switch won't be in the area it moves to, but in the area it moves away from. Most of the chemical and power plants, factories, and refineries in the industrial corridor between New Orleans and Baton Rouge is dependent on the abundant fresh water in the Mississippi River. All those plants will close and move if stranded on a salt-water estuary. And they can't just move over to the new River course because it will take centuries for the river to build up natural levees and create high ground along the river. That's a lot of lost jobs. Worse, New Orleans and most of the towns south of Baton Rouge take their drinking water from the River and that will disappear. The government will have to spend the money to make giant aqueducts from the Amite, Tangipahoa, Bogue Chitto and Pearl Rivers to provide drinking water for New Orleans and the river corridor cities. Also Baton Rouge and all of the cities along the old course discharge their sewer effluent into the river to be diluted and carried away by the giant river. All of that sewage would make a mess of a slack-water estuary and force each of those cities to reroute sewer outflows. Baton Rouge would have to switch to the Amite and cities south will have to pump their sewage long distances to find a suitable discharge area. Basically the cost of living will increase greatly and many high-paying jobs will disappear after the river capture. The port activities will remain, but it will be dependent on an massive and expensive set of locks and a navigation channel between the old River and the New River to allow upstream barge traffic to reach the old ports. New opportunities will open on the new course, however. And someone will make a fortune on the navigation channel connecting the two courses. A corporation with a half-billion dollars to invest and the ability to wait 80-100 years for the payoff could carefully research the path of most likely future course, the gradient profiles of the two courses, and determine the most likely corridor for the future navigation channel and buy all of the most favorable industry sites along it. In fact, such a corporation should hire me to do just that when I retire from LSU in a couple of years. :grin:
