Low levels on the Mississippi River could persist through the winter

Low water levels for a second straight year on the Mississippi River are causing problems at a critical time for those who rely on the river.

Fall is typically a busy time as farmers harvest their crops and look to ship those products down the river to eventually be exported, said Mike Steenhoek, executive director of the Soy Transportation Coalition.

“It’s game time in agriculture, and we need our supply chain to be firing on all cylinders, and unfortunately that’s not occurring right now,” he said.

The low levels are restricting the efficiency of barges by limiting how many barges can use the river and how much product they can ship, Steenhoek said.

“When you have less water in the river, you can’t load as much freight, in our case soybeans, per barge as you normally would,” he said.

The persistent drought across the Midwest this summer has left the ground in many places thirsty for any water, limiting what may reach creeks or streams and eventually the Mississippi, said Mike Welvaert, a hydrologist at the North Central River Forecast Center.

“We’ve only been seeing a very minimal amount of that reaching the river,” he said. “We’re so far behind normal that we just can’t catch up.”

Welvaert explained rain that fell in parts of Minnesota in late September helped replenish soil moisture, lakes and other smaller bodies of water.