BUTTE LAROSE, La. (AP) — Army Corps of Engineers Col. Ed Fleming leaned over a podium and warned the crowd gathered at a volunteer fire station in central Louisiana that where they were standing was projected to be swamped by up to 15 feet of water from Mississippi River flooding. The crowd let out a collective gasp.
To try to protect heavily populated Baton Rouge and New Orleans from the bulging Mississippi River, federal engineers are close to opening a massive spillway that will flood hundreds of thousands of acres in Louisiana Cajun country.
With that threat looming, some 25,000 people in an area known for small farms, fish camps, crawfish and a drawling French dialect are hurriedly packing their things and worrying that their homes and way of life might soon be drowned.
