The Mississippi River Is Trying to Escape

In the spring of 1973, a concrete dam in a Louisiana swamp almost failed — and the Mississippi River almost left New Orleans behind. The river has been trying to change course for decades, and the only thing stopping it is a few gates at a place called Old River. This is the story of a river that built a state, redraws borders, swallows its own delta, and wants out. 0:00 The night the river almost broke free 0:26 What's at stake 1:04 Part 1 · The Giant 2:06 Where it all starts 2:34 America's highway 3:02 Part 2 · The Wanderer 4:03 The river that keeps moving its mouth 5:11 Rivers that redraw state borders 6:22 Part 3 · The Shortcut 6:44 The cut that started it all 7:17 The Atchafalaya capture 7:52 The night of 1973 8:42 What if Old River fails? 9:21 Morganza, 2011 9:52 Part 4 · The Flood of 1927 10:21 Dynamiting the levee 10:57 Spillways 11:25 The giant model of the river 11:59 Part 5 · The Price 12:26 Louisiana is disappearing 13:02 Isle de Jean Charles 13:33 The delta that's growing 14:03 The dead zone 14:32 Will the Mississippi escape? 15:05 Your call Would you trust that wall — or let the river go? Tell me in the comments. Sources: U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (Old River Control Complex, Mississippi River & Tributaries Project), USGS, NOAA, NASA Earth Observatory, Mississippi River Commission (H. N. Fisk, 1944), John McPhee "The Control of Nature" (1989), U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (Isle de Jean Charles resettlement). Maps: relief — AWS Terrain Tiles (Mapzen terrarium); water and land change — EC JRC / Google, Global Surface Water (Pekel et al., 2016); rivers and borders — Natural Earth; river basins — USGS Watershed Boundary Dataset; physiographic regions — USGS (Fenneman & Johnson); state borders (close-ups) — U.S. Census Bureau TIGER/Line. Delta lobes, dead zone and schematic diagrams are simplified. Archival & government footage (public domain): U.S. National Archives — Mississippi River Flood of 1927 (Signal Corps); U.S. Army Corps of Engineers — Methods of Levee Construction on the Mississippi River (1931), Levee Construction near Arkansas City (1936), Bonnet Carré Spillway opening, Mississippi River & Tributaries Project, levee inspections, repair fleets; "The River" (Pare Lorentz, 1937, Farm Security Administration); USGS — sediment and flow monitoring on the Mississippi; NOAA Ocean Today; NASA Scientific Visualization Studio — Growing Plains; LMRCC / ERDC — Old River Control Complex. Drone and video footage courtesy of (YouTube): Max-AirVantage Drone Photography, Frank McMains, Charles Ham, Lee Alessi — Old River Control Structure; Daniel Rodriguez — Bonnet Carré Spillway; Brandon Hayes, Jeremy Elliott — Mississippi River Basin Model; Chris Good — New Orleans riverfront; Let's Fly Drones Already — Isle de Jean Charles; Austin Richard, cajun223, Charles Braun — Atchafalaya Basin; Jacob Job — Ghost Forest; Dastronaughts — Louisiana marsh; Eric Geibel, Bumble Bee Productions — Atchafalaya River, Morgan City; MadLensVideo, Aerial504 — refineries on the Mississippi; Clif Deroche — Mississippi River at Convent; Master Cam Sea & Land — grain loading; Richard Palmisano — Luling, LA; Momo Momo — Kaskaskia Island; Tony Gauldin — Mississippi River bridge; Marsh Parkey — Lake Chicot; Jason Hay — American Queen; PacificCuda — Steamboat Natchez; Hugo — hydro turbine; Werner Ag — corn field; Isaac Jones — sunset over the Mississippi, Lake City MN. Stock video: Pexels (Tom Fisk, Eric Skaggs, Engin Akyurt, CityXcape, Alfo Medeiros, Zetong Li, Dapur Melodi, Chris Flaten, Jabriel, utopia 36, Onur Kaya, Jim Patrick, Metro junction), Pixabay (Adgery, Engin_Akyurt, TravelingOnTheGo, jeanvdmeulen, McPix22, TPMotion, antonlukin, Thunderhawk1, hhach, u_z9s66kxdnj), Mixkit. Photos: Ancient Courses of the Mississippi River Meander Belt, Plate 22 — Harold N. Fisk, Mississippi River Commission / USACE (public domain); Itasca headwaters — Johanna San Martin, CC0; Missouri and Mississippi confluence — Chris Light, CC BY-SA 4.0, and Kbh3rd, CC BY-SA 3.0; Morganza Spillway, May 2011 — USACE Team New Orleans (public domain); 1927 flood, blowing the levee at Caernarvon — NOAA, Steve Nicklas collection (public domain); Red River Raft, 1873 — Robert B. Talfor (public domain); Wax Lake Delta 1984 and 2014 — NASA Earth Observatory, Landsat/USGS (public domain). Music & sound effects: Mixkit (Stock Music Free License / Sound Effects Free License) — Red Lights Adhafera, River Flow, Fragments Of Bangkok, Fallen, Opalescent, Xanthos, Feedback Dreams, Rest Now, What it Takes. Icons: Twemoji (CC BY 4.0).