Free Republic

Editor's Note: This piece was coauthored by Dan Lips.Coming soon to a parking lot near you: a hospital. Federal and state officials are rushing to create temporary medical centers to help patients during the pandemic. The White House recently announced that the federal government will partner with state and local governments to increase hospital capacity. One method is by directing the Army Corps of Engineers to construct temporary field hospitals. The goal is to help hospitals in virus hot spots such as New York City and Seattle that are reportedly overflowing. Hospital staff in Florida are preparing for a surge...

SIERRA VISTA — Cochise County residents are invited to learn how the Army Corps of Engineers plans to clean up decades-old munitions from local World War II-era training sites at a public meeting next week. The meeting, set for Wednesday at 6 p.m. at the Holiday Inn Express at 1902 South Highway 92, will cover the recent investigation by the Corps of two sites, both located within the San Pedro River National Conservation Area. The sites, known as the Artillery, Mortar Ranges and Maneuver Area and the Charleston Maneuver Area, were visited several times by the Corps in an effort...

"Why did it take Bea, van Heerden, and Garzino to shed light on this story?The Army Corps of Engineers, as an institution, is not very receptive to criticism, from inside or outside. It dominates the market for engineering certain kinds of projects, mainly to do with water. So the engineering profession is filled with people whose attitude is, "Better not rock the boat." And inside [the corps], it's arguably worse. It exists in a bubble of impunity. Because, as we lay out in the film, Congress likes the corps the way it is, and it doesn't really give it effective...

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — As record floodwaters along the Missouri River drench homes and businesses, concerns have grown about keeping a couple of notable structures dry: two riverside nuclear power plants in Nebraska. Though the plants have declared “unusual events,” the lowest level in the emergency taxonomy used by federal nuclear regulators, both were designed to withstand this level of flooding, and neither is viewed as being at risk for a disaster, said a spokesman for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. “We think they’ve taken all the necessary precautions and made the appropriate arrangements to deal with the flooding conditions,” said...

The Army Corps. opened the Morganza spillway on the Mississippi River in Louisiana on Saturday forcing tons of water and covering more than 100 acres of dry land with a foot of water within 30 minutes. The flood gates were opened to shift the flow of the swollen river away from the numerous oil refineries and chemical plants in Baton Rouge and New Orleans. While the flood waters will move away from the more densely populated area, the opening of the gates could affect 25,000 people, 11,000 structures, and acres of farmland. This is the first time the Morganza spillway...

The Mississippi River has topped a levee north of Lake Providence in extreme northeast Louisiana, flooding croplands as an effort by farmers to shore up the 100-year-old structure was thwarted by the rising river. About 12,000 acres behind the 18-mile-long levee, mostly planted in corn and soybeans, were flooding Thursday morning though no homes appeared to be in danger in the thinly populated area. Maintenance on the levee was abandoned years ago after another, higher levee was built farther back off the river.

Missouri on Sunday asked the U.S. Supreme Court to halt a plan to intentionally breach a levee on the rain-swollen Mississippi River, flooding Missouri farmland in an effort to save an Illinois town. Earlier, Missouri filed a federal suit to block the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers from following through on its plan to breach the Birds Point-New Madrid levee. A federal judge on Friday ruled against Missouri, saying a 1928 law permits the breach of the levee to ease pressure on the river. Missouri Attorney General Chris Koster filed an application for an injunction to the high court on...

CAPE GIRARDEAU, Mo. (AP) - A federal judge is giving the go-ahead to the Army Corps of Engineers' plan to intentionally break a Mississippi River levee in southeastern Missouri. The break could happen as early as this weekend to spare a flood-threatened Illinois town just upriver. Friday's ruling in Cape Girardeau turns back Missouri's bid to block the corps from blasting a hole in the Birds Point levee in Mississippi County, just south of Cairo, Ill. Missouri argued the floodwaters would ruin farmland and damage about 100 homes.

Tiny downstate Cairo, already battling the still-rising Ohio and Mississippi rivers, has been drawn into a controversial flood-relief plan that could put thousands of acres of farmland in neighboring Missouri under water. The plan calls for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to burst a Mississippi River levee to provide relief to little Cairo, population 2,800, as well as relief for a series of pumping stations, flood walls and levees. But the relief action will trigger flooding in southeastern Missouri, as opening the levee will allow water to flow over some 130,000 acres of Missouri land, mostly farms. The state...