it s the first of three explosions a desperate attempt to save nearby cairo, illinois, as record-breaking water levels threaten to wash out the small town. that s right. the floodwaters climbed past 61 feet, a dangerous, obviously, number marker to hit there in cairo. it s a dangerous spot stuck at the junction of the mississippi and ohio rivers. you see it there. the blast happened at the bird s point levee right below cairo. officials hope it will ease pressure, divert some of the water into the floodway marked in red on the map. that s thousands of acres of missouri floods. are you seeing red? i don t see the red. it s interesting. the corps of engineers operates an expansive system of locks, dams and levees down the mississippi and ohio rivers trag to control in the spring, mother nature every spring sort of tests all the engineering of these folks as they try they were trying to trick mother nature and people say you can t. i mean yeah. rob marciano is there.
should be, but we re nowhere near that, record flood stage, drew. we haven t seen the ohio this high since 1937. desperate times, certainly calls for desperate measures. this town has been evacuated. you know the pressure was so intense that the water was actually bubbling up from underneath the ground here. we had what they call sand boils, the arm corps of engineers had to combat against. remarkable situation here that they acted on last night. they still potentially have to do a couple more explosions down the floodway later today. what s the overall picture, rob? is the flood moving south and moving out to sea eventually, or are we still on the rise? reporter: well, there are some parts of even upstream still on the rise. we just had a bun. of rain, so places like
and rob, just initially here, did the breach work? have the water levels dropped? well, you know, for many. for this area, no. this is actually the area that was flooded. the water that you see behind me wasn t here this time yesterday. where they blew that levee, that video that you have been showing which is extraordinary and how often do we blow the holes in the levees and we are usually building them up and shoring them up, but beyond the trees a mile and half or so is that levee or a section of it was blown apart last night, so that water could flood into the area. this is designed to be a floodway, and extraordinary case like this, they thought it was the ultimate backup, and that s why they let the water come in through this area. so, cairo, and some areas across the river, they have seen water levels drop well over a foot, and conditions in those areas are improving, but in other areas, well, it is a different story. yeah, i mean, we don t often
see explosions of levees and i know it was a contentious issue, and chad myers updated me on the cairo side that it is down a foot and a half, but rob, wasn t the army corps of engineers supposed to do a third or maybe a second or third breach today? is that on schedule or not? no, it was delayed, but we have heard them an hour ago pop a second one and they will do a third one likely later on this afternoon or evening, and they are smaller and this is the big one and released a lot of the pressure and the water has to go somewhere and it cannot sit here, so a couple of smaller holes at the bomb of the floodway will slowly allow some of to water to go become to the mississippi farther down stream, but it is like cutting part of the sweater off of the right arm and sewing it on the left, and it is hard to dissipate all of the water, because the surge
land there, you ll destroy the farmland. well, that s that s what made the decision so difficult for general walsh, the president of the mississippi river commission, who had that responsibility, he said its and a heart wrench decision but the reality is the pressures on the flood risk management system, the system of levees and flood walls in this area was so great, and all of the criteria for operating the floodway had been met, and he really had no choice but to go ahead and order it be operated. we hope it continues to work. jim pogue, from the army corps of engineer, many thanks for joining us this morning. like the rest of us, celebrities have a lot to say about the demise of the most wanted terrorist. he d yet to hear of mutual funds, iras, or annuities. back then, he had something more important to do. he wasn t focused on his future but fortunately, somebody else was.