I commuted between New Orleans and Lafayette during the flood of 1973. The waterflow thru both spillways was incredible. When the river is at high water, the difference in elevation between the top of the river and the top of the lake is substantial. Substantial enough to be scary.
I wished I could have stopped on the side of the Interstate to record it last summer--it was like a rushing torrent you'd associate with a dam bursting or a flash floor, but a mile wide. It was insane.
Another awesome video. The Mississippi impressed me when we were visiting Southern Louisiana. Biggest river I've seen in my life by a large amount. Also, it is the biggest managed river in the world. Well, one could make the point of the Netherlands, a country that is basically a bunch of civil engineering projects, but still...
Once upon a time I lived in the Netherlands and went look at the Zuiderzee Works, which make the Mississippi River control structures seem like playthings. Long-term I want to do a similar series on Dutch flood defences, but I could only do justice if I travelled over there to do it. Maybe my channel gets big enough I can get enough revenue to do it, but until then the outlines for the videos sit on my hard drive.
Great video, I am from the Netherlands, we also have a history of floods and levees which sometimes broke, it is really interesting to see how both Louisiana and the Netherlands use similar technics to prevent floods in the future using spillways.
Longtime very interesting Fun French word... Environmental changes are expected because it would be a natural phenomenon but agriculture chemicals is bad. But the structure is not in fault but the agriculture practices
I haven't had the chance to do really deep diving on the building of the spillway, but I saw one person online state that landowners along the river ensured that the spillway wouldn't be build at the crevasse, but on someone else's land down stream. No way for me to corroborate it but that was interesting to see.
@@lorencklein Actually there are still some homes left in Montz. When the spillway was built in 1927 some families in Montz lost land. Then in 1973 a bunch of sand boils appeared on the dry side of the levee in Montz and 44 families were given a few days to gather their things and get out. A back levee was built before the original levee failed. I read that one guy was a contractor so he jacked his house up and moved it before the deadline. There was an historic marker on Airline Hwy about Montz for a long time but I don't think it is there any longer. Here is some info from someone who is from one of the families impacted by the building of the spillway in 1927 and the building of the back levee in 1973. www.stcharlesparish-la.gov/departments/economic-development-and-tourism/parish-history/town-histories/montz-town-history
