WI: Old River Control fails in 1973

The Blue-Eyed Infidel

Just re-read "The Control of Nature"; fascinating article, with McPhee's customarily briliiant prose.

Has anyone done a TL where the Old River Control fails in 1973 and the Mississippi is (at least temporarily) diverted to the Atchafalaya?

I searched the forums; perhaps not as extensively as I could have, but I'm having issues with search at the moment, and the only one I could find is "A Very Bad Year - 1973", which starts off with this, but given what happens with the rest of the TL, one could be forgiven for forgetting that this had happened by the end of it.

Are there any others?

And does anyone wish to speculate as to what the effects might be?

TB-EI
 

BlondieBC

Banned
It is not temporary, it is a permanent change of the main channel.

Morgan city is destroyed, and the oil support infrastructure is rebuilt elsewhere.

The Mississippi to New Orleans and north to the chemical plants is dredged deeper. Not a huge deal, for example, the New Orleans section is less than 10 extra feet. They probably shorten the path to the sea, and make one of the bypasses how one gets to the Ocean from New Orleans. The land below NO will begin to sink, so the long finger around Venice will become open ocean even faster then OTL.

If the failure is sudden, you could get 20K dead in Morgan city area, but I think they would evacuate in time.
 

The Blue-Eyed Infidel

BlondieBC said:
It is not temporary, it is a permanent change of the main channel.

Morgan city is destroyed, and the oil support infrastructure is rebuilt elsewhere.

The Mississippi to New Orleans and north to the chemical plants is dredged deeper. Not a huge deal, for example, the New Orleans section is less than 10 extra feet. They probably shorten the path to the sea, and make one of the bypasses how one gets to the Ocean from New Orleans. The land below NO will begin to sink, so the long finger around Venice will become open ocean even faster then OTL.

If the failure is sudden, you could get 20K dead in Morgan city area, but I think they would evacuate in time.
Click to expand...

What I meant by temporary is: Is it within the capabilities of the Army Corps of Engineers to restore the flow channel once Old River Control has failed? If so, would it be too expensive to fund?

TB-EI
 

BlondieBC

Banned
The Blue-Eyed Infidel said:
What I meant by temporary is: Is it within the capabilities of the Army Corps of Engineers to restore the flow channel once Old River Control has failed? If so, would it be too expensive to fund?

TB-EI
Click to expand...

I used to live in New Orleans, and the understanding is once the river moved, the course would not be restored. River chose the steepest course to the Ocean and the Morgan City route is a lot steeper. There were also believe to be some very difficult technical issues related to moving the river back, but I don't know what they are.

Assuming the people are evacuated, it will not be expensive, but workable. The Chemical plants keep working. New Orleans can still be reached by Ocean going ships. A city of 20K will need to be built on a new location, and some new port facilities will need to be built. Rivers change course.
 
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