Winter Flooding on the Mississippi

Persistent rains and saturated soils across the watershed swelled the river to its banks and occasionally onto floodplains.

Image of the Day Water Floods Severe Storms

Meandering Mississippi River

The wandering river is a boon to farming, but it has no interest in state borders.

Image of the Day Land Human Presence

Memphis, Tennessee

Set on bluffs above the muddy, flood-prone Mississippi River, the city has long been a crossroads of water-borne and land transportation in the heartland of America.

Image of the Day Water Human Presence

Taming the Mississippi River

Engineers use levees, floodways, dams, and much more to control the ever restless Mississippi.

Image of the Day Land Water Human Presence

Lay of the Land Between Old River and the Mississippi

This model of the land elevation between the Mississippi, the Atchafalaya, and the Old River show the uphill fight to control river flow.

Image of the Day Land Floods Human Presence

Winter Flooding in Mississippi and Louisiana

Persistent heavy rains in the first two months of 2020 have swelled rivers from Missouri to the Gulf of Mexico.

Image of the Day Land Water Floods Severe Storms Human Presence Remote Sensing

Low Water on the Mississippi Causes Barge Backup

The drought of 2012 reduced traffic to one towboat at a time; groundings closed parts of the river for hours to days.

Image of the Day Human Presence Remote Sensing Water Color

Mississippi River Floods Gulfport, Illinois

A wall of water washed over the small riverside city of Gulfport, Illinois, when at least two levees on the flooded Mississippi River burst on June 18, 2008, reported CNN. Only treetops and a few roofs were visible above the surface of the blue-green water two days later on June 20, when the commercial satellite Ikonos captured this detailed photo-like image.

Image of the Day Land Floods

Mississippi River Well Below Normal

Coming off of the extreme floods of 2011, the river was approaching historic lows in the summer of 2012 near Memphis and along much of its lower reaches.

Image of the Day Land Drought

Mississippi River Sediment Plume

Image of the Day Land Water

Lingering Floodwaters near Vicksburg, Mississippi

These false-color images compare conditions along the Mississippi and Yazoo Rivers around Vicksburg in June 2011, during heavy flooding, and three years earlier.

Land Floods

Floods in the U.S. Midwest

Floods

Flooding in Memphis

Acquired May 10, 2011, and April 21, 2010, these natural-color images show flooded and normal conditions along the Mississippi River in Memphis, Tennessee.

Image of the Day Land Floods Human Presence