RAPID: Mississippi Flood of 2011 - Investigation of Initial Impact on the Landscape

University Of Illinois At Urbana-Champaign, Urbana IL

Investigators

Abstract

RAPID: Mississippi Flood of 2011 - Investigation of Initial Impact on the Landscape EAR-1140198 Praveen Kumar, Gary Parker, Jim Best, Marcelo Garcia, Bruce Rhoads, Michelle Wander, Jeff Nittrouer, Robert Darmody, Arthur Schmidt, Murugesu Sivapalan, Jonathan Greenberg (Univ. of California, Davis), Robert Holmes (USGS) Abstract The objective of the proposed Rapid Response Research grant is to undertake field campaign, in-situ sampling, and Lidar survey of selected regions of the Lower Mississippi River and surrounding landscape impacted by the 2011 extreme flood. PIs interest is to understand how deliberate but uncontrolled levee breach at Birds Point, and engineered diversions at Morganza and Bonnet Carré spillways impact both the streams and the surrounding landscapes. In the proposed effort they plan to (1) characterize flood deposits by sampling sediment depth, depositional area, and sediment grain size distribution and stratigraphy; (2) investigate soil morphology and their properties such as soil organic carbon, pH, cation exchange capacity, texture, and bulk density; (3) characterize response of landscape form and structure at all three offtake sites by characterizing the bathymetry, flow, and sediment transport; and (4) evaluate landscape impact through Lidar survey near and downstream of the Mississippi and Ohio River Confluence including large sections of the Birds Point New Madrid (BPNM) floodway. The data collected will allow them to assess if large episodic events, such as the present Mississippi flood, shape the long-term form and function of rivers and the surrounding floodplains, and the timescale of the impact on the flow and transport dynamics. Studies using this data will assist in future planning of water and sediment diversions in the lower Mississippi River basin.