Margaret S. Petersen
Was this due more to other factors than just the rivers the Corps was working on then,
because the Mississippi certainly has a huge sediment problem?
The Upper Mississippi does not carry much sediment; there are sediment problems on the
A:
Middle and Lower reaches of the Mississippi.
But you don't have any dams on the lower part?
No, exactly.
A:
The upper part, isn't that where you get the load? It comes out of the Ohio and the Missouri
then.
A:
It primarily comes out of the Missouri; the Ohio doesn't carry very much sediment. There
is some sediment transport on the Upper Mississippi, and a lot of those navigation pools have
pretty well filled in now, except for the navigation channel, but they've been there sixty years
or more. The poor foundation materials at the dam sites on the Missouri, I think, was one
of the main reasons that those dams had not been built earlier. Foundations are something
that engineers learned a lot about during World War II. I think people at
who had been
active in airfields design and construction during World War applied what they learned
there to geotech and dam foundation design on the upper Missouri River.
So a lot came out of the work on those airfields?
A:
A lot came out of World War that enabled the Corps to design and construct dams on
foundations previously considered unsuitable for a dam. The dam foundations on the
Missouri are primarily shale.
Morning Glory Spillway
How much came out of the work they had done on Fort Peck? Fort Peck's got a reputation.
A:
Yes, it has. At the time I was in the Missouri River Division, there were problems with the
Glory" spillway. Do you know what the intake looks like at Fort Peck?
I've seen pictures of it, but since I'm not a trained engineer.
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