The back flow-prevention barge blocking Bayou Chene for the past three months has been refloated and removed and is no longer preventing marine traffic from moving to and from the Atchafalaya River.
Removal of the barge was completed on Aug. 27.
The barge had been in place for three months, the third time it has been moved into position to prevent rising water from the Atchafalaya River from flooding low lying portions of Lower St. Martin, Assumption, St. Mary, Lafourche, Terrebonne and Iberville Parishes.
The full cost of the operation to deploy the barge has yet to be calculated, but the second and most recent time it was used, in 2016, the cost was more than $7 million. The only previous deployment was in 2011.
The measure was taken after a record period of high water on the Mississippi River brought warnings from the Corps of Engineers of a possible Morganza Spillway opening in June. The attendant rise in the level of the Atchafalaya River can cause back flow through Bayou Chene into Lakes Verret and Palourde and widespread flooding in the Morgan City area and low-lying parts of six parishes.
The trigger point for the opening of Morganza was narrowly avoided, but the Bonnet Carre Spillway was opened for the second time in 2019, the first time it has opened twice in a single year.
A water level differential of several feet at the barge indicated that some level of flooding would have occurred, according to FEMA officials.
In February, Governor John Bel Edwards announced that the Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority had pledged $80 million in Gulf of Mexico Energy Security Act (GOMESA) funds to build a permanent floodgate and levee protection system in the area.
The structure will extend from the swamps southeast of the bayou to Morgan City. Construction is scheduled to start later this month, with completion expected in mid-2022.
