Levee fails near Iowa town along Missouri River

HAMBURG, Iowa — A Missouri River levee a few miles from this town failed on Monday, prompting a flash flood warning for the area. A separate levee breached as well on Monday, sending water towards the Missouri state park and resort of Big Lake.

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The breach some five miles from Hamburg created a 50-foot-wide hole in the same levee that had three partial breaches last week.

Water flowing through the hole is expected to reach Hamburg and Interstate 29 after crossing several miles of rural land.

With a population of 1,100, Hamburg is being defended by a secondary levee that the Army Corps of Engineers is just now finishing.

But it's not clear yet whether that will hold back the water. Some 600 people in the southern half of the town evacuated last week after the partial levee breaches.

Downtown Hamburg remained completely dry, nearly three hours after the levee failed, with some businesses like the Hendrickson family's Blue Moon Grill & Bar still open for business — though surrounded by sandbags 12-feet tall.

"Our drugstore and our little bakery on the corner are open, too," said Wilma Hendrickson, the family's 77-year-old matriarch.

But city officials warned those who stayed behind that within 24 hours the waters would reach the secondary berm, and that power was likely to be quickly lost when they did.

"Things are going to happen fast, I think," said Wilma Hendrickson's daughter, Vicki Julin. She said the family's bar, open since 1972, had "been a watering hole for a long time. Now it's literally going to be a water hole."

The emergency response was focused for now on the area south of the city, where Hendrickson said customers and other family members had told her the floodwaters were "filling in rapidly ... it's bad."

Army Corps of Engineers projections show that in a worst-case scenario, the volume of water released upstream during a levee break could leave 8 feet to 10 feet of standing water in the southern part of Hamburg. The area includes manufacturing and agricultural businesses. Water could reach the fire station and city hall, but it likely wouldn't reach the northern part of town where most residents live.

Officials are also concerned that the smaller Nishnabotna River that flows into the Missouri could back up and flood part of the town.

"It's all coming toward us," Fremont County Emergency Management Director Mike Crecelius said over the weekend.

In nearby Holt County, Mo., officials said a 75-foot-levee breached about five miles from Big Lake.

The region is expecting a summer-long battle against the bloated Missouri River.

Dave Weaver  /  AP

Crews work last week on a secondary levee aimed at protecting Hamburg, Iowa, from the flooding Missouri River.

Peak flows are expected to arrive early this week in riverfront communities in Iowa, Kansas, Missouri and Nebraska as the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers completes a gradual increase of releases from dams upstream. The surge through the lower half of the river this week will expose any weaknesses in the flood protections.

"They're going to be as prepared as they can be," said John Benson, spokesman for Iowa's Department of Homeland Security and Emergency Management Division.

The Corps said this summer's Missouri River flooding could rival the record years of 1952 and 1993 in some places. Officials on Tuesday will increase releases from five of the river's dams to 150,000 cubic feet of water per second — more than twice the previous record releases.

As a result, the river will rise 5 to 7 feet above flood stage in most of Nebraska and Iowa before continuing into Missouri, where it may rise 10 feet above flood stage in several places and flow over the top of at least 11 rural levees.

The record releases from the dams are expected to continue into August, so the river will remain high all summer, interfering with highway and rail traffic in the region. Parts of Interstate 29 have already been closed, and Union Pacific was re-routing some trains around Omaha.

Places in most danger of flooding include the small Iowa towns of Blencoe and Pacific Junction; the Nebraska communities of South Sioux City, Rulo and Plattsmouth; and St. Joseph in Missouri.

"I think there's a 50 percent chance it's going to be ugly. And there's a 50 percent chance we're going to squeak by," said James Gerweck, the emergency manager in southeast Nebraska's Richardson County.

About 60 miles north in Nebraska City, business has slowed at the Fingers, Faces and Feet salon because customers have cancelled appointments to help with sandbagging, owner Shelli Eyman said.

"The last thing they need to worry about right now is their nails and their hair," Eyman said.

Crews from the Corps have been monitoring all the Missouri River levees closely, so any problems should be caught early, agency spokeswoman Monique Farmer said.

Members of the Winnebago Indian Tribe have been especially concerned about their casino about 20 miles south of Sioux City, Iowa, and only a half-mile from the river. The Tribal Council approved a spending freeze in case flooding closes the casino, which provides about 300 jobs and more than $5 million in annual revenue, treasurer Sarah Snake said.

More than 200 volunteers have built an 8-foot-high berm around the casino.

"Every day, we're checking and keeping a close eye on everything," Snake said. "It's frightening, really, to see what could happen."

Nearby in South Sioux City, Neb., water is expected to rise about 7 feet above the 30-foot flood stage. The Corps has built a 7,000-foot-long earthen levee, and a foam-and-concrete wall stands ready as a backup barrier.

Officials in the city of 13,400 haven't ordered any evacuations, but City Administrator Lance Hedquist said roughly 20 houses in the city's northwestern corner will be destroyed because they aren't protected by the new levee.

"We think we'll be ready," Hedquist said. "I feel very good about where we stand. The past few days have been stressful, but we had a plan."

Managers at A-1 Used Cars in South Sioux City have developed a contingency plan to move their fleet across the river, to higher ground in Iowa if the river rises even more than expected.

"We're just taking a wait-and-see attitude," said manager Paul Johnson, who has lived in the area his entire life. "I think that everybody around here had a false sense of security with all the dams upstream on the Missouri River. We thought it was fool-proof."

The Corps has blamed the massive water releases through the 2,341-mile river on a combination of heavy spring rain in the Northern Plains and a huge Rocky Mountain snowpack.

The only time the river has been higher in Nebraska and Iowa during the past six decades was in 1952, when the river crested above 44 feet at Sioux City and above 40 feet at Omaha. This summer, the river is expected to reach as high as 37 feet at Sioux City and 36 feet at Omaha.

In Missouri, the 1993 flooding was generally worse than the 1952 flood. In 1993, the river crested at 48.9 feet near Kansas City and at 38.3 feet in Jefferson City. This summer, the corps predicts the river will reach as high as 39 feet in Kansas City and 35 feet at Jefferson City.

The Corps predicts the water will rise high enough to flow over the top of several levees in rural Holt County, Mo., flooding farmland. The Missouri River also is expected to flow over a Missouri levee on the opposite bank from Atchison, Kan., and to spill over levees on both sides of the Missouri-Kansas border as the river flows south from there.

Another likely flood spot, according to the corps, is the Kansas Department of Corrections Levee System near Leavenworth.

Even if levees hold initially, there are concerns about what will happen as the high flows continue for weeks or months.

"The longer the water sits on the levee slope, the more you begin to worry about seepage and slides and will the soil remain intact and cohesive?" said Jud Kneuvean, chief of emergency management for the corps' Kansas City district.