The French Quarter Festival Second-Line Kickoff Parade made its way through the French Quarter kicking off its 36th year of the festival in New Orleans on Thursday, April 11, 2019. NOLA.com | The Times-PicayuneFor months, residents in the southeast corner of Louisiana have relied on bottled water for drinking and cooking, with the water from the faucet coming out salty.
But with little precipitation in the forecast, officials are now hastily preparing for if and when the salt water will reach the state’s most populous city — New Orleans.Typically, the mighty flow of the Mississippi River — which stretches from northern Minnesota, through the center of the continental United States and out to the Gulf of Mexico — is enough to keep mass amounts of salt water from intruding too far upstream.
While most of the state still has fresh water flowing out of faucets, water advisories have been issued in parts of Plaquemines Parish since June. Edwards warns that other parishes may soon be affected by the salt water, including Orleans, St. Bernard and Jefferson. Although that likely won’t happen until mid-to-late October.
In addition, millions of gallons of fresh water are being taken by barges to treatment facilities in impacted areas. Officials say they are doing what they can during the sill augmentation to keep the channel open to ships and barges., which has left the river so low that barge companies are reducing their loads.