MISSISSIPPI AMOK



In mid-'93, the mighty Mississippi found new freedom, coursing unrestrained from Minnesota through Missouri. The event was first considered a 100-year flood, the likes of which having not been witnessed in that time; but its continued catastrophe would soon elevate it to the status of a 500-year flood, requiring aid of over sixteen billion dollars.

Aftermath images relayed by the media still pull the heart ... the woman wading in her living room for former valuables ... the boats and canoes now more useful than cars ... kids fishing in Main Street, though it wasn't allowed ... the hundreds hauling sandbags, passed in a relay hand to hand, and all with a desperate optimism that these valiant efforts would not prove as futile as they appeared to some.

Then, in the second month, the sand ran out. Gravel now filled the bags, each an amorphous potential hero, worth more than its heft of sand or gravel ... each was gold if it could merely stop the water. Hope remained an eternal spring ... exceeded only by that of Nature, itself, which played no favorites. Makeshift levees found water more powerful than the desperate heart which formed them, leaching bags adrift as so much worthless flotsam. Breaches happened everywhere before the final crest of almost fifty feet ... rendering hindsight painful to those projecting only thirty-eight.

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Roofs were barely visible in places ... the message of all now lost was lost on none ... that living in a flood plain held absolutely no guarantee that the eventual unthinkable might not actually happen ... that the Wonderful River might one day prove not to be so. Others would pummel themselves even worse --those who'd blindly voted against the cost of just such a wall to keep the wonderful river away, for a day like today.

How many homeless and dreamless this has left ... the Mississippi Flood of 1993 ... was not easily determined. Experts knew it would take another month to drain, at least.

The scope of this tragedy, like its hurricane destroyers Andrew, Iniki, Georges, and so many other disasters, continues to reinforce that all of our technological magic is yet comprised of quite gaping voids. We can make a satellite perform by typing in a keyboard command from the Earth ... a message will fly through the air to alter the function of that distant object many thousands of miles away in geocentric orbit. And equally impressive is our past contact with astronauts on the moon and the retrieval of data sent from our probe passing Jupiter.

We have planned the constructions of a super-collider and an anti-matter facility to probe the understanding of particles and their opposites. And these are only examples known to the public ... many secret projects, known strictly to the government, can only be guessed at. Suffice it to say, that our technological ability is most impressive, private or public.

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Why is it, then, that we can't yet even control our weather? The closest we ever came was the lightning rod and the later use of silver iodide to seed the clouds for rain. Fine. We figured a few things out. After centuries of watching our buildings destroyed by the random power of nature, formerly attributed to Zeus, Franklin finally showed us how silly was such deification.

To repeat: Why can't we control our weather? Or, at least, though we can't always see it coming, why can't we do something about it when it's here? Specifically, why can't we smart people figure out how to make rain appear in a cloudless drought, or disappear in a flood? Is it beyond our scientific prowess to equalize our cold and heat, our wet and dry?

Despite current abilities through space, perhaps the neglected meteorological conundrum has proved greater than our ability for its resolve? In that case, it would certainly behoove our national agenda to entertain all ideas toward this end. One such thought should not prove impossible for contemporary scientists:

As water is a molecule of hydrogen and oxygen ... is it not currently feasible to separate these atoms and effectuate their release into the atmosphere? Can we not envision and develop what might be called a "molecule splitter," a field-unit device which, in a flood area, can simply suck in water and separate its atoms, reducing a deluge into its gaseous components?

Actually, there is such a device. Recorded under U.S. Patent number 4,394,230, the "Method and Apparatus for Splitting Water Molecules" was registered to Dr. Andrija Puharich of Stanford Research Institute in 1983, according to Atlantis Rising magazine of August '95 at page 26. Whether this technology will ever see widespread commercial use -- that's the important question.

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And, as for the laborious filling and transport of countless thousands of sandbags ... why is it necessary to undergo such antlike industry and waste its attendant, precious time? Have we no other vision for this emergency, no greater solution than an endless chain of passing sandbags? With our knowledge of plastics technology and the ability to manufacture any item in any shape or size or custom application, is it an impossible extension to apply this ability on-site, as needed?

Can't we begin, at least, to end the suffering of our citizens with the same dedication common to previous space projects? Can't we learn at least as much about Earth weather as we have about space atmospheres? Must we ever wring our useless hands and call it Fate's decree ... or, finally, are we ready to determine what's to be?

Could we not envision the immediate formation of plastic retaining walls or sections, custom-molded on-site, or a spray-on coating to strengthen otherwise weak spots in existing walls or levees ... or interlocking pre-fab pieces which, by ingenious design, resist the pressures of the flood? Can we see no further than an endless chain of bags of sand?

Let's address this problem with more than muscle and vainglorious hope. Our intelligence and present technology would seem to beg a more fitting solution than futile prayers for deliverance.