Terrebonne ready for storm season
June 7, 2016
Terrebonne Parish safety net for vets is built
June 7, 2016
With another season of storms brewing in the Gulf of Mexico, Terrebonne Parish is building up its defense system against extreme weather.
Contractors have been hard at work, with dump trucks moving tons of dirt to build up reaches of the Morganza-to-the-Gulf hurricane protection system. Recent permit approvals have almost 50 consecutive miles of the project either constructed or ready for work.
The Morganza system is designed to feature 98 miles of earthen levees offering between 9-15 feet of protection, extending from Terrebonne’s town of Gibson to Lockport in Lafourche Parish, according to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Aligning the levees will be 22 floodgates on navigable waterways and 23 environmental water control structures. The system’s major feature is the Houma Navigation Canal lock complex, a $300 million project along one of Houma’s most important waterways.
Reggie Dupre, Terrebonne Levee and Conservation District executive director, said his organization, which is in charge of the parish’s coastal protection and restoration, has focused primarily on defensive efforts such as the levee system.
As of February, the TLCD has built eight of the 22 floodgates, with more on the way. Five of those floodgates are along the Morganza footprint, while three others line parish levees that provide auxiliary support to the flood protection system.
Terrebonne Parish President Gordon Dove said a permit was issued on May 1 to plug the part of the levee system near Bayou Four Point rather than putting a floodgate there. That work will ensure Terrebonne has 35-consecutive miles of protection from the Falgout Canal Floodgate to the Pointe-Aux-Chenes Floodgate. Within that stretch, contractors have been working on segments, referred to as reaches, of the Morganza system.
• Reach G-2, near the southern end of Lake Boudreaux, is the plug at Bayou Four Point contractors are working to finish. According to Dupre, it will offer about the same protection as a floodgate, but without the convenience of being able to open it when the parish pleases. However, the project’s cost will also be greatly reduced.
Dove said the parish is mobilizing as many trucks as possible to close as much of that reach before storm season’s peak. Teams of trucks are dropping and compacting dirt on both the east and west sides with the plan to meet in the middle. Dove estimated the gap was a little less than 1,200 feet during the last week of May.
• Reach E lines the Falgout Canal Road from the lower Dularge parish levee to the Houma Navigational Canal. Work on that started recently, and Dove said that levee should be finished by next hurricane season.
• The Bubba Dove Floodgate, located on the Houma Navigation Canal structure, was being retrofitted on the Harvey Canal for new wenches. Dove said the floodgate should be back at the HNC by June 5.
• Reach J-2, on the eastern side of the system between the Humble Canal Floodgate and the Pointe-Aux-Chenes floodgate, has been raised, according to Dove. “J-2 alone from Pointe-Aux-Chenes to Montegut has been lifted. They lifted right at 9 feet, and that was the goal by this hurricane season. They achieved that,” he said.
• Work on reaches K and L, extending north and then west from the Pointe-aux-Chenes Floodgate into the Lafourche Parish portion of the system, should begin in August. Dove said work on the 11-mile section is expected to take two years.
• Terrebonne Parish also took time to raise its redundant levees in Bayou Black at the beginning of the year when officials were monitoring the threat of flooding in the Atchafalaya River. With a state of emergency declared, Terrebonne workers were able to use private roads to build up levees along Bayou Black near Gibson. Dove said the parish completed about 12 miles of levees, elevating them from 3-4 feet to 7 feet. He said the parish still has work to do across the swamp to complete the parish levee work in that area.
With hurricane season here, contractors and parish workers could face more challenges from weather. Dupre said aside from causing lost work days, storms threaten the integrity of projects in progress.
However, Dove said everyone involved in building up Terrebonne’s protection will keep at it until Mother Nature says they cannot, all with an eye on the short- and long-term goals of a parish protected for decades from the ever-encroaching Gulf waters.
“We keep working. We keep working until the hurricane comes,” Dove said. “Of course, we’ve got to work around the rains and everything else. Our big key right now is to close in Four Point. That is the big goal right now.” •
