Will the Corps be caught in a wringer?

May 25, 2011 Powersite Dam

It's never much fun for a man to get his 'appendage' caught in a wringer, but that's exactly what could happen to the Corps of Engineers if the weather suddenly goes south, (in my opinion).

As of this posting, the lake level at Bull Shoals was posted at 667.14 feet above mean sea level as of 6:00 AM CST. That was about three feet higher than it was to start a month that had seen just 1.5 inches of precipitation in the area since the 1^st! In addition, year to date rainfall was just about average based on historical numbers. So what gives? Why is the water level almost to the point of flooding out some popular parks that exist close to the Bull Shoals waterway? Very good questions, aren't they?

Homes on Taneycomo side of dam

My personal theory, and please understand it is pure speculation, is that the Corps has been withholding water at the Bull Shoals Dam near the Arkansas border in order to give farmers on downstream the ability to max out their arable lands. This, to the detriment, of some folks living between the Taneycomo and Bull Shoals dams on up stream. Not a good thing if found to be true. Another intrusion by a Nanny government who thinks it know what best for everyone. But wait! Things just might get worst!

With the 'pipe' plugged at one end, any exceptionally heavy rain that might fall will rapidly change thing from sorta bad to much worst, for everyone! Take the months of April and May in 2011. Everything was fine, lake levels were normal and then towards the end of the month the rains began to fall. Wham-bam, starting on April the 23^rd, we got hit with two and a half inches of water from the skies! Then the next day, another 2.4 inches fell. On the 25^th, over three inches. As a matter of fact, from April 22, 2011 to the 29^th – 9.1 inches of rain were recorded, and everyone knew that that the water levels were going to rise... then the early May rains arrived! Another two inches hit between the 1^st and the 3^rd. That came to about a foot of new water over much of southwest Missouri and northern Arkansas in just a couple weeks time! 

Shadowrock Park on the left!

In 2011, many many people who lived near the Tri-Lakes waterways were impacted by all that water. Any back then water levels were 'normal' at the start of April. Can you just imagine the effect of that much rain over a short period of time with things as they are now? You know, maybe there is something to the fact that when the new bridge goes up just to the east of Forsyth that will replace the one built in the fifties, it will be even higher up than the current one! A bridge that was built, back then, by the Corps and which was supposed to be flood proof!