Wave-Wash Control on Mississippi River Levees

Unprotected levees along the lower Mississippi River are subject to serious wave-wash damage where the foreshore is narrow and without protective vegetation. The need for protection works is almost continuous below New Orleans, La., and intermittent as far upstream as Baton Rouge, La. Above New Orleans the situation is less severe because ship traffic is lighter and the river banks are generally high enough to contain the river at ordinary stages, limiting wave-wash attack on the levees to periods of high water. Many types of protection have been suggested, and most of them have been tried, but no single type has met reasonable criteria for economy and effectiveness. Present practice (1953) is to use either of two major types of protection for the levee, and under special conditions, a supplemental structure to keep the wave wash protection work from being undermined.