>> at 1500 this afternoon, we will open up the morganza floodway. we'll start with one bay. and that will bring about 10,000 cubic feet per second down this floodway. >> reporter: in order to save cities downstream, for only the second time in 38 years, engineers have begun opening some of the 125 gates of the morganza louisiana spillway, allowing the overflowing mississippi river to flood thousands of acres of harm lands, homes and structures, and displacing as maybe -- many as 2500 people. >> they told us to move as the we were moving, period. >> not coming back. >> not coming back. not to leave a toothpick behind. >> knowing that all of this that you worked for is going to be gone, that's all you can think about report roirt was an agonizing decision for the army corps of engineer. sacrifice these homes and farms to save cities down teem. the mississippi could overwhelm

. >> the crests we thought we were going to have a couple days ago prior to opening up the morganza floodway has been reduced because of that operation. >> reporter: the river is now expected to reach a height of 45 feet in baton rouge on wednesday instead of the record 47.5 feet previously calculated. new orleans will top off at 17 feet and go no higher according to the national weather service. >> the corps continues to assure us there should be no flooding and the main line levees are projected to hold.

people are in danger if you open that morganza floodway. what do you say to them? >> right now a lot of work has been done in morgan city. the national guard is giving them additional protection. but from 191 2, 1927, 1937 and 1973 this area has flooded. down to morgan city. that's one of the reasons why that floodgate was put in morganza to control that water and most of that area is agricultural area. until you get to morgan city which has a ring leavee around it to help protect it. the corps has done a lot of work but private levees have been built to protect homes. we're at a high-risk situation right now. >> general russel honore, thank you very much. we hope for the very best those in baton rouge and all along the mississippi river and those areas that will be impacted by this ongoing flooding. >>> it has been a tough disaster year in the last nine months, 32

the only other time they opened the morganza floodway, the river was powerful enough that it almost destroyed the control structure that have it was pouring through and they obviously recognized that weakness and buttressed it over another cul structure and strengthened that considerably. that is the main change from the design that came out of the '50s. >> brown: larry larson, we also keep hearing about decisions and tradeoffs that have to be made about opening the floodgates and flooding some farmland in order to save other areas. has that always been with us as well? i mean, is that designed into the system that these kinds of decisions and tradeoffs are going to be made? >> it was designed into the system and after the 1927 floods. and it's not a unique approach. it's been used elsewhere in this nation. we use in the different rivers. it's on the sacramento river and other areas. it's used in other nations. china has major bypass systems and storage systems where when major industrialized systems are threatened they flood farmland and other land. it's a tradeoff and in this case at the fl

dveown rir-- near baton rouge, louisiana-- the corps ha asked permission to open gates on the morganza floodway for the first time since 1973. that wouldlood thousands ofou acres, but might prevent even worse flooding in seven parishe he the corps already opened some of the gates at the bonnet carre spillway, 30 miles north of new orleans, to ease pressure on that city's levees. now, some of the levees themselves need reinforcing against the increasing water pressure. >> we are actually on the backwater levees, these levees attach to the mainline mississippi river levees, and what we are doing is, just for a precautionary measure, we are adding a polyurethane type plastic to the back side of the levee, if they, if the water gets high enough that it flows over the levee and flows down the back side, this helps with erosion to keep it from damaging the levee if the water should go over. >> brown: the potential for catastrophe was evident at wamphis, tennessee, where the ter mayekak re wetos ettoat, esaf c tsngtion tuesday.ng e before-and-after photthkeogratas n from spaceta show the effects ony h

the morganza floodway and the spill zwrn way, th spillway, floodway, spillway, any way to move the water and prevent flooding. that's the plan. you're driving on the highway, you take an exit off. this is an exit ramp to move the water in one direction. opening the floodway, whether to do it or not to do it. it's been done once before but not for this reason. so this morganza floodway designed for flood control, going to lower the river along baton rouge and new orleans, but it will fool other areas in cairo. if it doesn't, it will be half a foot from the top of the floodwalls. t.j. it's a lesser of two evils, whether to do it or not to do it and regardless, someone will be impacted. >> a lot of bad choices for folks along the mississippi. alexandra, good to have you with us. >>> eight minutes past the hour, it is mother's day, a lot of people going to go out and seb grating, having a nice lunch, bunch or dinner, spending family time together. in the south a little different for a lot of folks. some folks are having to spend this day in shelters, slims victims of the devastating tornadoe

. >> the crests we thought we were going to have a couple days ago prior to opening up the morganza floodway has been reduced because of that operation. >> reporter: the river is now expected to reach a height of 45 feet in baton rouge on wednesday instead of the record 47.5 feet previously calculated. new orleans will top off at 17 feet and go no higher according to the national weather service. >> the corps continues to assure us there should be no flooding and the main line levees are projected to hold. >> reporter: the result was accomplished by opening even fewer gates of the spillway than anticipated. only 11 of 125 are open now. that means the low-lying less- populated areas in the path of the spillway tide will probably have more time to prepare for the water water's approach. so far, slower and shallower than once feared. >> you're still going to have thousands of homes underwater, millions of acres of water but certainly better news than what we were facing just as recently as this past weekend. >> reporter: in melville, louisiana, in the path of the floodwaters, roger harrington c

they opened up another one to take the mississippi river farther south, and it is called the morganza floodwayat floodway was opened 11 chutes now open, and they can open more, but they have not opened them yet. but butte larose will be two feet over flood stage and that will put a lot of water in the home, and then you see six feet over the floods and then morgan city seven feet over flood stage which will put moderate amounts of water from morgan city from the back side if they can't hold it back. this is protected by a nice wall, but if you go over it, it will not protect well. lit take days to get, there and it is not there yet. this is a great map from google earth. i want to zoom you into new orleans. i want to take you to what is go going to happen there. take you into new orleans and all of the way down to where the new water will spill out, and the mississippi river this way, and the water will spill out this way, brooke. >> into lake pontchartrain. >> no, into the gulf of mexico. >> that is the bonnet carre. forgive me. >> and the morganza came this way, and the numbers on the chart

the next question is when do we open the morganza floodway. ust took a brief from the district commander. he recommends that we continue with the opening of morganza spillway, and i directed him, the mississippi river commission directed him to open those bays today. i'll have colonel fleming talk to you about that in just a moment. >> we're going to continue to monitor what the u.s. ear corps of engineers is saying, that they will be opening up the morganza spillway later on today. that's to try to prevent severe flooding in baton rouge or new orleans, but that doesn't mean that there won't be other communities that may bear the brunt of flooding as a result of the swelling mississippi river. we'll continue to monitor the developments there. ed lavandera is there as well. he'll be joining us later on. >>> meantime it is graduation season. hundreds of thousands of students are actually getting their diplomas. can you guess how much they paid for their cap and gown? just a quick quiz. the answer when we come back. your advertising mail campaign

at 1500 this afternoon we will open up the morganza floodway, we'll start with one bay and that will bring about 10,000 cubic feet per second down this floodway. >> reporter: if number you really need to pay close attention to is 1.5 million cubic feet of water per second. that is the threshold, the trigger point along the mississippi river. and once it's reached that point, that's when officials here will need to start taking water off the top. that means there's too much pressure on the levee system near baton rouge and new orleans. right now they're at more than 1.6 million cubic feet per second. clearly it's now time to engage in this plan here and start letting the water flow out. that will happen within the hour. fredicka. >> ed lavandera, thanks so much. meantime, let's go north about 200 miles and take a look at these homes right here. we're talking about greenville, mississippi, lake ferguson where, believe it or not, the river is still a day or two from cresting. this will get much worse as the water continues to rise. greenville is right on the river on the arkansas state

and this morganza floodway is one of them and we've got to take some excess water off the top of thevels that are coming down. >> and we are told that this opening, the beginning of it, it's a long process, but the beginning of it, the first opening could come as early as 2:00 local time tomorrow afternoon. is that correct? >> well, yeah. i've been g to operate that floodway, and when we reach the trigger of 1.5 million cubic feet per second, then we will, in fact, open that floodway and again, take the pressure off the levee systems that are downstream from that particular structure. >> and colonel, what do you say to someone who comes up to you. you heard and saw, you were there, someone comes up to you and says, you cannot do this. there has to be another way. do not destroy everything that we have. >> what we do, we operate this as a system. but, you know, the bigger thing that we do is we go around, we talk to these folks face to face, and we stand shoulder to shoulder with the mayors, the local officials, and try to help them through it. what i've done in some of these communit

what you see behind me, here the structure is the morganza floodway structure.pening them about 1:30 central time. when you walk over the bridge here, you look back over that dry land, those gates will send that water back over that way and it will curve to the south about 100 miles down to morgan city, and that flooding through this river basin is what will be flooded here in the coming days, we're told the water will take about three days to reach morgan city, so there's a lot of communities, a lot of wide open farm land as well. as you mentioned, the trigger for this is that 1.5 million cubic feet per second of water on the mississippi river, that puts too much pressure on the levee systems between baton rouge and new orleans and that's why they would have to open up this spill way here, that's too much pressure there and if the levees were to be breached there that would be catastrophic in places like baton rouge and new orleans. so they will send this water into more remote areas, but as we mentioned t.j., a lot of communities, a lot of farm land that will

let's go right to the morganza floodway and i will tell what you it means. sippi river. what they did over the weekend is they opened up the gates at morganza. the gates allow water to come down in a low area, low level. this is the bayou. these are difference and swamps and the bayou. but people do live there. but they knew, these gates haven't been opened since '73. they knew when they built there or moved there that this was a possibility. this is the outlet to save new orleans and save baton rouge and they had to use it. now new orleans actually crested, cresting right now, they're not going to let the water go too far from where it is now. but still cresting for baton rouge and the like. i have one more picture. we talked about how they opened that spillway. bonnet carrey. this water won't fill up lake pontchartrain because they filled up morganza. a lot of water will go down there, not pollute lake pontchartrain like it could have. >> thanks, chad. >>> the u.s. is now focusing on mending relations with pakistan. senator john kerry is in the pakistani ca

and whenever we got word that we were going to get, you know, high water this year from the morganza floodway, sooner or later it would have to be open and we scrambled and put together and -- well, i say we're in the process of putting together a levee now to protect about 240 homes and -- >> so are people putting up some levees by themselves? are they taping up their homes as we've seen in some communities? are they heeding the warnings to get out of town? >> yes, for the most part, they are. the people south of town that are not going to be included in the levee that the national guard and the department of transportation are building, they -- some of these people are building smaller levees around their homes in anticipation that we're going to get this backwater which is late. the schedule they gave should be here but we're not seeing it as of yet. but they say it's coming. so we're just sitting and waiting -- i say sitting and waiting, we're busy trying to get this levee completed. looks like we'll have it done by the time we do see water. >> is this the worst disaster your community ha

this is the morganza floodway with smaller towns that would be flooded anyway, but subject to back water flooding. it tends to flow backwards flooding people even more. >> host: again, that website is facebook.com/operation watershed. michael, go ahead. >> caller: yes, i was calling because my husband's oping l, he live -- uncle, he lives out in missouri, closer to kansas, and i was just calling, he's called home on mother's day, and he said that it was still raining out there. i was just calling to find out how much damage they think it's going to do out there? >> host: we'll get an answer. can we predict the damage at this point? >> guest: i don't think we can because we still have high water. you know, folks stay attuned. watch the national weather forecast, see what the weather is supposed to do. looks like we're in relief now, a dry spell. as said earlier, the river crested in memphis so the water is moving downstream and looking for cresting to occur in new orleans and so forth, but with the amount of water out there, it's likely to be into june before it recedes enough and dries o

. >> when we operate the morganza floodway today, we are at a trigger of over 1.5 million cubic feet per second. we are not supposed to see a crest until may 22 of 1.626. so, here we are on the 14th, with the crest not expected to come for eight more days. the national weather service tells us the crest will last at least 10 days, maybe longer, and then we have to wait it -- for it to recede below the trigger. although the river gets what the river needs, and we will do our best to modulate that flow based on daily calculations, we could have this spillway open for upwards of three weeks. >> what is your best guess for when the farmers and ranchers will be back in business? >> well, when we operate this floodway today, eight days before the crest, then we keep that operated for 10 days after that, and then when we wait for the flood to recede, it will be a couple of weeks before folks will be able to come back into this area. >> could you tell us how confident you are? [unintelligible] >> the structure was last operated in 1973, however on a daily basis, we pulled these gates in and

morganza spillway. >> if you look at some of the history from 1927, if these levees and reservoirs and floodways would not be in there, it was an 80-mile width of water covering five states. >> the flashlight, the mirror, a life jacket, water, my pets, and a pistol. >> all right. look at this. it's just a mess for these folks downstream as i bring in reynold wolf here now. we keep calling this this slow-moving disaster. it is rare you have this kind of a heads-up of what's coming. literally, they have had a couple weeks now. >> that's the whole point. you want everyone to get word about this. isn't it amazing when you think about the heavy snow we had in the upper midwest in october, november, december, january, february, march, and now all of that had to go someplace right into the mississippi river. with heavy rainfall, about 600 times the amount they normally have, 600% the amount they normally have, all flowing right into the basin and we're now dealing with it today. >> no more rain today or nothing significant in these areas will have an effect. >> thankfully the weather will cooperate today but

morganza spillway? >> not really. i think we all lived with the idea that, hey, we know this is the potential, this is what this whole floodway system is for. wouldn't want to live anyplace else. but that's part of what comes with it. but certainly this is a floodway. it is built as a floodway. there was no -- that decision was made way back in '28 and the '30s and all that, after the '27 flood, this was the design. so from that perspective, that's what it's here for. it's here to provide that relief valve for the river. >> reporter: the water level reached here in '73? >> that's correct. >> reporter: this is part of the wall that held it back? >> that's correct. >> reporter: we're about 100 miles north of morgan city. about 3:00 central time, 4:00 eastern, if you look about halfway down this flood structure, one of those gates, perhaps two later on today, will be opened up. and all this area that you see out here behind me will begin to fill up with water. fredricka? >> thanks so much, ed. we'll check back with you throughout the day. >>> up river, the state of mississippi is dealing with its worst flooding in decades. flood

morganza spillway? >> am i angry about it? no, i think we all live with this potential and this is what this whole floodway system is for. i wouldn't want to live any place else, but that's part of what comes with it. certainly, this is a floodway and built as a floodway. no, there was no, that decision was made way back in 1928 and the '30s all of those after the '27 flood. this was the design. from that perspective, that's what it is here for. it's here to provide that relieve valve for the river. >> this is where the water level reached in '73. >> '73. >> this is part of the wall that held it back. >> that's correct. >> and, t.j., the most important thing right now for officials here in south central louisiana is to get people out of the path of the water. they've been going through a lot of these small towns that are in the path of the water, urging them all to evacuate. we've seen that in places where people have been literally packing up every belonging they have into moving trucks and vans and trailers to get out of town. t.j.? >> it's interesting to hear his attitude about it. he says, we understand. he's not ups

morganza. it was built in about 1860. it survived the '27 flood. >> if you look at the history from 1927 if these levees and reservoirs and floodways had not been in there, there was an 80-mile width of water covering five states. >> reporter: that's why the army corps of engineers will monitor the levee and spillways for days to come. >>> good morning to our buddy reynolds wolf this morning. we talk about this stuff on the way, the water on the way. >> right. >> it will take a few days to get to some of the communities. a tough wait. >> it's ridiculous. when we saw the images ed lavandera was showing through us. that was a torrent going through. one gate and we're talking 280 million gallons? >> 269 million gallons. >> unbelievable. >> by the end of this hour that's how much. >> by the end of three days some people will be under 20, 25 feet of water. even though we have that water today, tomorrow, tuesday, roughly three days for the water to make its way to morgan city. it's preventative measure to make it go between the levee system, flooding an area of 3,000 square miles. we're going that measure, diverting the water so it will not flood baton

morganza spillway. it has alleviated some pressure in the larger cities, certainly happy about that, breathing a sigh of relief. those folks, a lot of people that are being sacrificed in the spillway, in the floodwaying since we got here last night. this is a wide river base, a wide area where all this water can go. it is taking its time getting downstream towards i-10, butte larose and morgan city. butte larose probably won't crest for another week. significant delays in the water getting down because there is so much of it and it is so wide. we spoke to a number of people yesterday. a lot of them are taking the, well, we will wait until it gets here attitude. they are moving out. they are moving their stuff into safer ground. as far as them moving out full-time, that quite hasn't happened yet. some folks are taking the entrepreneurial spirit out and trying to raise some money in some unique ways. >> we are doing t-shirts and everybody is evacuating. we are not leaving until you see the water coming. >> reporter: there you go. in the meantime, selling t-shirts, almost sold 200 of them at $20 a pop. raising money for her and her neighbors and family for when they have to move out and potentially l