Bonnet Carre Spillway Opened 3 April, 2020 Closed 1 May.

Anita Lee, Sun Herald News, reported that on top of the novel coronavirus, South Mississippi has a familiar enemy to deal with: the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers expects to open the Bonnet Carré Spillway as early as Friday, 3 April according to Joe Spraggins.

Spraggins who heads the Mississippi Department of Marine Resources, said he received a call about the opening  from the office of Gen. R. Mark Toy . As commander of the Corps’ Mississippi Valley Division and president of the Mississippi River Commission, Toy decides in consultation with the Corps’ New Orleans district engineer, whether to open the Bonnet Carré.

Spraggins said Toy’s office advised him that 150 to 160 of the spillway’s 350 bays will be opened for three to four weeks. The trigger point for opening the spillway, established under the 1928 Flood Control Act, is a flow rate of 1.25 million cubic feet per second at the Carrollton gage on the river at New Orleans. Flood stage is 17 feet.

The river is expected to reach a flow rate of 1.35 million cubic feet per second and crest at 17.3 feet on the levees by April 12, the Army Corps says forecasts now indicate.. Opening the spillway will allow the swollen river to safely pass New Orleans.

This would be a record-setting third year in a row  for the spillway to open . The longest opening in spillway history, in 2019, decimated oyster beds off the Mississippi Coast and is blamed for the deaths of dolphins, sea turtles and other aquatic life.

The 123-day opening poured trillions of gallons of Mississippi River water into Lake Pontchartrain and the Mississippi Sound beyond, dropping salinity levels below the norm.

The prolonged opening over the summer months also allowed blue-green algae to flourish, closing the Mississippi Sound to swimming during the tourist season.

 Federal fisheries disasters  were declared in Mississippi, Alabama and Louisiana.

Spraggins said he hopes the Bonnet Carré will open for a much shorter time this year. He said damage would not be as bad if the spillway could be closed by the end of April.

If the spillway remains open as the Mississippi Sound grows warmer, he expects problems in South Mississippi.

“We can live through a lot but we can’t live through 120 days,” he said. “If it runs past April, we’ll definitely have a lot of issues.”

Because of COVID-19, the Army Corps is foregoing the usual in-person meeting of stakeholders prior to a spillway opening and instead will schedule an online call-in for Thursday.

“The Mississippi River Levee system protects millions of lives downstream, many of which are currently threatened by the COVID-19 pandemic as the greater New Orleans area struggles against one of fastest growing COVID-19 infection rates in the nation,” an email from the Corps’ New Orleans District says.

“The system safely transported far more water last year than during any previous historic flood on the river (1927, 1937, 1973, or 2011) and will do so again, especially when so much else is at stake. We are committed to work proactively alongside our local levee district partners to ensure its continued success.

Workers in May 2019 open bays of the Bonnet Carré Spillway to divert rising water from the Mississippi River to Lake Pontchartrain, upriver from New Orleans, in Norco, Louisiana. This was the first time the spillway had opened twice in one year, with the earlier opening in February. From the lake, the river water flows into the Mississippi Sound.

April 16th article by Sun Herald’s Anita Lee shows that the Corps ‘ignored’ endangered species along Coast when opening Bonnet Carré, new lawsuit says:

Two nonprofit environmental groups claim in a federal lawsuit filed against the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and Mississippi River Commission that the agencies have violated the Endangered Species Act by failing to properly study the damage Bonnet Carré Spillway openings cause.

The nonprofit Defenders of Wildlife, a conservation group headquartered in Washington, and Healthy Gulf, based in New Orleans, name treasured Gulf Coast species harmed by the openings, including the Kemp’s ridley sea turtle, piping plover shorebirds and Gulf sturgeon, an enormous fish often referred to as a “living dinosaur.”

The lawsuit is at least the third filed against the Corps in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Mississippi. The Mississippi Secretary of State has filed one of the lawsuits, while a second was filed by Coast localities and two associations.

All three lawsuits are pending before U.S. District Judge Louis Guirola Jr.

Mississippi River water that floods into Lake Pontchartrain and the Mississippi Sound beyond to avoid flooding the New Orleans area decreases salinity levels, carries a high load of pollutants and sediment, and lowers water temperatures. All these factors potentially harm the endangered species and their habitats, the lawsuit says.

The Corps has long operated under the assumption that the Bonnet Carré would open an average of once every 10 years, the lawsuit says. But with increased river flooding, the spillway has opened six times in the last nine years, including an unprecedented 123-day opening in 2019 that resulted in federal fisheries disasters for Gulf states, including Mississippi.

“In 2019 alone, when the Spillway was opened twice for a total of four months, oyster beds were destroyed, commercial fishery operations devastated, and hundreds of dolphins died and washed ashore potentially as a result of the decreased salinity in the Mississippi Sound,” the lawsuit says.

“ . . . Yet neither the Corps nor MRC have acknowledged or evaluated the many potential impacts of these diversions on nine threatened and endangered species that inhabit and migrate through the Lake Pontchartrain Basin and Mississippi Sound.”

The impact on endangered or threatened species and habitat never studied are:

▪ Five species of sea turtle (Kemp’s ridley, loggerhead, green, leatherback, hawksbill)

Two species of shorebird (piping plover, red knot)

▪ West Indian manatee (found in Lake Pontchartain and Lake Bourgne in the summer months)

▪ Gulf sturgeon

▪ Critical habitat for the loggerhead sea turtle, Gulf sturgeon, and piping plover.

“The Corps and MRC failed to complete consultation despite substantial scientific evidence establishing that operation of the Spillway may affect these listed species and critical habitat in myriad ways,” the lawsuit says.

“Instead, the Corps and MRC have concluded that some individual Spillway openings would have ‘no effect’ on these species. These findings are unsupported by any stated rationale and contrary to available evidence. For other openings, the Corps and MRC have ignored these species altogether.”

“Moreover, to the extent the agencies issued ‘no effect’ findings, they did so only after the Spillway had been opened and closed and the damage was done.”

The Army Corps and MRC do not comment on pending litigation.

The lawsuit asks that Guirola declare that the Army Corps and MRC are in violation of the Endangered Species Act, order them to consult with either the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service or National Marine Fisheries Service, depending on the species or habitat in question, and award attorney’s fees and court costs.

The Army Corps and MRC are being sued because the U.S. Army Corps commander over the Mississippi River Valley Division also heads the MRC and ultimately decides whether the Bonnet Carré should open.

The Bonnet Carré most recently opened April 3. It has opened for a record-setting three years in a row when the river reached a flow of 1.25 million cubic feet per second established in the 1927 Flood Control Act.

The Corps announced Monday that it would begin closing the spillway, a process that takes time. But the river remains high, and 80 of its 350 gates were open on Tuesday, the last date for which information is available. Water was pouring into Lake Pontchartrain at a rate of 81,000 cubic feet per second. The maximum rate is 250,000 cfs.

“As more extreme storms and varied weather increase the number and intensity of floods in the lower Mississippi River valley region,” the lawsuit concludes, “it is likely that the Spillway will be opened more frequently and for increasingly longer duration in the future.

“This in turn will increase the frequency and duration that imperiled species and habitats are subjected to Spillway water pollutants and other impacts.”

As a new year and a new decade are about to start, many businesses are still reeling from the effects of the record opening of the Bonnet Carre Spillway. Top, from left, are empty oyster shells, the open spillway, a beach advisory sign; middle row: blue-green algae in a marina in Bay St. Louis, the sign at the end of Cowan Road and U.S. 90, construction on the Mississippi Aquarium; bottom row: construction on Margaritaville’s amusement park, a beach sunset, and the crowd at the Sun Herald’s community forum on the spillway’s impacts. Sun Herald

On Friday 3 April, The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers opened 10 gates of the Bonne Carre Spillway in response to the 17' height of the Ms River in New Orleans.

The Corps says that over a four week period around 95 to 110 of the spillway's 350 bays will be opened. 10 to 20 bays will be opened at a time based on the river forecast. At maximum, an estimated 120,000 to 130,000 cubic feet per second of water will flow through those bays.

NEW ORLEANS, La. (WVUE) - For the fourth time in three flood seasons, a crew from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers began opening the Bonnet Carre Spillway.

The spillway upriver from New Orleans is designed to prevent flooding in the city and surrounding areas.

“We do this to help save lives,” said Major General Mark Toy, commander of the Mississippi Valley Division.

Normally a spectacle drawing huge crowds, the spillway opening was limited by the COVID-19 pandemic to a small group of Corps staff and media members.

Without action, the National Weather Service forecasts the river flow in New Orleans would exceed 1.25 million cubic feet per second, the trigger point for spillway.

Three other times this season heavy rains in the country’s middle section brought the river close to the threshold to operate the spillway.

“We approached it, didn’t meet it,” said Colonel Stephen Murphy, the New Orlean District commander. “Here we are at the fourth time.”

In Louisiana and Mississippi, commercial and charter boat captains, who are already losing business to the pandemic, fear more damage to fisheries.

"A double whammy," charter boat captain Frank Becker told WLOX-TV earlier this week.

"By the time this clears out, we'll be facing that situation again, and it's even a longer, drawn out process for us."

Critics want the Corps to make more frequent use of the Morganza Spillway upriver from Baton Rouge, which has operated only twice in its history.

Toy said the Corps is working with congressional leaders to authorize a study of the river and the various flood fighting tools.

"We hear the people who are concerned about how we operate the system," Toy said.

However, the Corps says the potential solutions are not simple.

• BP oil spill - 95 dead dolphins
• Bonnet Carre Spillway opening -- 123 days total 
• 154 dead dolphins
• 175 dead sea turtles

• After the spillway opening, most oysters are dead from the fresh water

• After the spillway opening seasonal shrimp catch numbers are down

Shrimpers have to travel farther from the fresh water to catch shrimp

• You can’t have saltwater species in river water. Simple as that. Our crabs, our shrimp, our oysters, speckled trout, our tourism, we can’t do it in river water.

• “If we had to rely on catfish, bass, frogs and alligators, that would be one thing, but our whole economy is driven off of our saltwater industries, and that’s being eliminated by this influx of river water.”

Anita Lee reported that Mississippi State Secretary Delbert Hoseman filed a suit against the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and Mississippi River Commission have violated federal law by failing to study the consequences of diverting Mississippi River Water into the Mississippi Sound through the Bonnet Carré Spillway, Secretary of State Delbert Hosemann says in a lawsuit filed Monday.

“This is not only unlawful, it is inexcusable,”the lawsuit says”

His office filed the lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Gulfport against the Army Corps of Engineers and MRC, the two agencies responsible for flood management on the river. The lawsuit also accuses the agencies of “willfully and obstinately” refusing to open the Morganza Floodway to relieve river flooding, despite the authority to do so.

The Mississippi Sound has borne the brunt of polluted river water, with trillions of gallons flowing through the Bonnet Carré in 2019 while the Morganza Floodway in centeral Louisiana remained closed. The discharge also includes river sediment that has blanketed the water bottoms of the Mississippi Sound.

The Bonnet Carré empties into Lake Ponchartrain and the Mississippi Sound beyond.

Hosemann wants a preliminary injunction that directs the federal agencies to also open the Morganza when river flooding is a problem instead of directing all the floodwaters through the Bonnet Carré.

He also is requesting that the judge order the federal agencies to update an environmental study, called an Environmental Impact Statement, that addresses the impacts of river water on the the Mississippi Sound. Previous studies have failed to evaluate damage to the Mississippi Sound, the lawsuits says.

Hosemann held a news conference Monday afternoon to announce the lawsuit, filed by attorneys from Balch & Bingham in Gulfport. Hosemann said he that his office was forced to file the lawsuit because the Corps has been unwilling to work with Mississippi on alternatives to opening only the Bonnet Carré.

“If the injunction is not granted, a substantial threat of irreparable injury exists in the form of massive freshwater inundation to a saltwater body, namely the Mississippi Sound,” the lawsuit says. “Such freshwater inundation will not only upset the delicate ecological balance of the Sound, but will also inflict serious economic damage to the people and businesses that derive their livelihoods from the Sound.”

An updated Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) would require the agencies to assess environmental impacts on the Mississippi Sound and consider less destructive alternatives to opening the Bonnet Carré.

This is the second lawsuit filed in federal court in Gulfport against the Army Corps and MRC. The first, filed by several Coast localities and two private associations representing hoteliers and the seafood industry, also calls for an EIS and other relief.

“We thank Secretary Hosemann for today’s powerful action and look forward to working with the state to protect the Mississippi Sound,” said Gerald Blessey, who heads the Mississippi Sound Coalition that includes Coast localities suing the Corps.

Repeated openings of the Bonnet Carré in recent years are without historic precedent. The spillway opened twice in 2019 for 123 days, releasing trillions of gallons of river water and causing $215 million in damage to Mississippi fisheries and the seafood industry, the lawsuit points out.

Such changed circumstances should under federal law prompt an updated EIS, the lawsuit says. Other changes the lawsuit enumerates since the last EIS, which was 43 years ago:

▪ Ecological changes to the Sound caused by Hurricane Katrina in 2005 and the BP oil catastrophe in 2010.

▪ Sediment and silt buildup that have raised the bottom of the Mississippi River.

▪ Changes to the coastline’s shape and the size of its barrier islands.

The lawsuit also points out that the Corps and MRC have “absolute discretion” to open the Morganza Floodway, where excess river flow is released into the Atchafalaya Basin. The Morganza Floodway has been opened only twice in its history, most recently in 2011, when the Bonnet Carré also opened for a prolonged period.

Mississippi officials urged the Corps to open the Morganza in 2019, but the Corps said the river did not reach the trigger point of 1.5 million cubic feet per second. The lawsuit points out that the Corps’ water control manual allows the Morganza to be opened even if the flow rate does not reach the established 1.5 million cubic feet per second.

The Corps, “without explanation, justification, or rationale, has willfully and obstinately refused to open the Morganza Spillway, which is per se arbitrary and capricious,” the lawsuit says. “Failure to do so has resulted in a 100% diversion of all floodwaters directly into the Mississippi Sound.

”Hosemann has filed the lawsuit as the steward of Mississippi’s tidelands — water bottoms subject to the tide’s ebb and flow.

The Army Corps and MRC have 60 days to respond to the lawsuit, which represents only one side of the case.

Hosemann said he will continue to support the lawsuit when he ascends to the lieutenant governor’s office. Secretary of State-elect Michael Watson of Pascagoula, currently a state senator, said he will continue to “aggressively pursue” the lawsuit when he takes office January 9.

The State of Mississippi, through its Secretary of State Delbert Hosemann, has filed suit against the US Army Corps of Engineers over the operation of the Bonnet Carre' Spillway and its associated severe damage to Mississippi's ecosystem and economy. Also filed was a similar lawsuit by Mississippi coastal government bodies and nonprofit organizations.

A request was made to Gulf Coast Resource Coalition to file an Amicus Brief as part of the pending lawsuits in Federal Court, and our organization - as always - will keep you updated on events as they happen.

 https://www.sunherald.com/news/politics-government/article238824753.html#storylink=mainstage_lead 

Follow us on Twitter @ GulfCoalition

At last weeks CCA Bay Chapter at the Leo Seale Center in Waveland, Ms, Mr. George Cavignac of the Gulf Coast Resource Coalition (GCRC) spoke about upcoming Ms river diversion projects proposed by Louisiana's Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority (CPRA). He showed how the proposed diversion projects could be as detremental to the La and Ms coastal ecosystems as the Bonnet Carre was in 2019.

The Mid-Barataria and Mid-Breton Sound diversions, proposed as “diversions to build land" would actually cause a loss of land because the intrusion of the fresh water from the diversions would kill the saltmarsh. 

The saltmarsh ecosystem is the nursery grounds for La. And Ms. fish, shrimp and oyster crops. Without the saltmarsh we won’t have any fish, crabs, or shrimp. No shrimpers, No crabbers or No oystermen. The commercial seafood industry will decline and be non-existent if these fresh water diversions are built and be allowed to introduce the polluted fresh water into the saltwater ecosystems of La. And Ms. 

All of New Orleans and Ms seafood will have to be imported into La and Ms from other locations. 

Click on the link below to see the magnitude of the 2 proposed plans being carried out by the CPRA! 

 http://eli-ocean.org/environmental-review-in-the-gulf-how-could-revised-nepa-regulations-impact-coastal-restoration/ 

George also pointed out that dredging the Ms river, caused a land gain versus the negative land loss of diversions. Should dredging replace the proposed diversions, since there as a positive land gain? 

And, as we learned from the 2019 Opening of the Bonnet Carre Spillway, the Ms River fresh water intrusion is not just fresh water, it is very polluted fresh water from all the farmland drainoff up and down the Ms River from Minnesota to Louisiana, over 2000 miles.

In 2019 the intrusion of polluted fresh water caused algal blooms and the closing of all the beaches on the Mississippi Gulf Coast. This was a major economic blow to the coastal counties of Mississippi. It also caused death to marine mammals porpoises and whales.

The brown shrimp season was almost wiped out. Shrimpers had to travel farther to catch less shrimp because of the openning of the Bonnet Carre Spillway a record 2 times in 2019.

After the spillway opening, most oysters are dead from the fresh water

Fish species were killed or displaced. With the fresh water intrusion in Lake Pontchatrain trout and other species moved out of Pontchatrain and Delacroix until late fall after the Bonnet Carre spillway was closed for the second time on 27 July, 2019 and the salinity returned to these areas.

What will happen in 2020?

We will be waiting and watching to see!

Comments are appreciated! Please send comments to: dunnygreen@gmail.com.

The surface salinity contours are created using salinity data from fixed stations and from supplemental data collected by Lake Pontchartrain Basin Foundation (LPBF). Isohalines are manually delineated by LPBF’s coastal geologist using GIS software. Downloaded and sampled data are used to adjust the previous week’s isohalines to reflect the latest survey week conditions.

To Produce accurate isohalines offshore LPBF utilizes forecasted models generated by the Coastal Observing Research and Development Center –Navy Coastal Ocean Model, the Naval Research Laboratory –Ocean Dynamics and Prediction Branch, and NOAA’s Northern Gulf of Mexico Operational Forecast System. Salinity models are generally run four times per day, and generate 6-hour nowcast and 48-hour forecast guidance. Products include a time series graphic depicting surface salinity. (Figures 11-13, taken from the LPBF web page)

These oceanographic models are scientific computer generated predictions about the present and future conditions of Gulf waters. The predictions rely on either observed data, or forecasts from large-scale numerical models. LPBF staff reviews these salinity models for the specific Hydrocoast period, and produces the offshore isohalines accordingly.

Comments are appreciated! Please send responses to dunnygreen@gmail.com.