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| Randy Mayse posted River history quiz # 832 Where is this at, about what year, and what’s going on? Look just off the wing trip. So as part of the 30 year, 3 billion dollar Olmsted Lock & Dam project, they decided to build floating guide walls. There were four in total, up to 350 feet in length. They graded and poured slabs in a recess behind a levied area at James Marine, Paducah. They constructed all of the guide walls there and then waited for a high river to breach the levy and float them out. These four floating sections were towed 36 miles south to be placed on stationary pilings. The guide walls slide up and down on these imbedded guides, depending on the whims of the river. There they sat for over 16 years for the dam to be built. Some think that once placed, these floating sections were filled with concrete and sank to the bottom. Not so. They are still floating, doing the job they were built for. Thanks to my son Jeff Mayse for flying me around that. Always an exciting ride when he’s flying. |
Joey B Taylor: Building of the floating long walls for Olmsted locks in the 90’s James Marine behind the old Harcon Barge Building.
Randy Mayse shared
So have they ever again used those slabs that they poured in the 1990s? Evidently they never restored the breach they made in the levy to float the wall segments out.
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| Vick Patel, May 2018 |
An old and new lathe, each with a shaft being worked. This implies that the diesel engine in a towboat is still directly coupled to the prop.
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| Jason Adams, Nov 2020 |
Actually, the "new lathe" is probably a milling machine.
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| Jason Adams, Nov 2020 |
So there was a flood in 2018 as well as in 2019? Is this the flood that beached the old towboat?
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| Vick Patal, Mar 2018 |
While checking out the satellite image, I noticed the flood plain was under water. Unfortunately, Google no longer has an accurate year for the Imagery copyright.
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| Satellite |
While I was looking, I checked out the flood wall. It is not wet, but one can't drive closer to the river like we did when we visited the town. The flood of 2019 did hit the Missouri River much worse than the Ohio River.
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| Street View, Jul 2019 |
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| Satellite |
It appears Google's satellite image has updated to the 2019 flood. We can see that the top of the guide walls have stayed above the water, but the lock walls are submerged.
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| Satellite |
This earlier image shows the lock walls when the water level is lower.
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| Satellite Google Map image as of Aug 2017 and Aug 2020. |
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