U.S. Army Corps of Engineers officials are expected to begin repairing nine sections of a levee along the Black River in northeast Arkansas that was damaged by floods last month.
Emergency workers are making plans to cover the holes in case of torrential rains such as the ones in May that caused record river levels in Pocahontas, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reported.
“We’re looking, if we have another flood event, to come in and do some quick construction work on the levee,” said Jim Marple, the Corps’ emergency management planner in Little Rock.
Plans include installing meshed “baskets” in the holes and filling them with soil, sand and rocks to stop flooding.
Running Water Levee District member Don Cox said the cost to repair the levee is estimated to be about $2 million.
Marple said the Corps is expected to bid the project in the summer. He said construction could begin in January or February.
In the last nine years, the levee system has broken three times.
In 2008 and 2011, the levee broke and flooded thousands of acres of farmland south of Pocahontas.
The Running Water Levee District was established after the 2008 flood. The district initiated a property tax in 2010 to put toward levee repairs.
The levee system was built in 1939 to protect farmland along the Black River.
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