Shipping on the Mississippi

One of the things that we enjoyed while we were staying near Dubuque was visiting the Lock and Dam 11 and watching barges and boats go through.

Dwayne wrote up his thoughts:

My love and I were enjoying watching barges go both down and upstream on Mississippi River at Lock 11 near Dubuque, Iowa.

It seems that grain gets carried down and coal barges move up stream. It takes about two hours for one set of 15 barges and its tow (line) boat to completely pass through the lock. That is five rows and three across of barges.  Only a maximum of nine barges will fit into the lock at a time, so the nine are unfastened from the the other six and the tow boat. The gates are then closed and the water rises with the first set of barges. When at the right level, the upper level doors are opened and the nine barges are pulled out of the lock by a winch. The gates close, the water level goes down, the lower gates open and the remaining six barges and tow enter the lock to be raised to the same level as the previous nine barges. All are finally reconnected and the barges along with their tow continue up river to either their port or the next set of locks.

River information from Mississippi River Museum and Aquarium:

Information about boat building in Dubuque

Human changes to the Mississippi

Wing dams

 Two of Dwayne's pictures of the coal-carrying barges heading upriver:

Note the guy sitting under the shade of the front red barge covers!

The tow boat

I had so many pictures that I put them together into a video: https://youtu.be/QGeKrtkEwgY

In looking up information about river barges, I found this farm article: http://ri.search.yahoo.com/_ylt=A0LEVr4f4YhZzzMAWmxjmolQ;_ylu=X3oDMTByODJtaWUzBHNlYwNzcgRwb3MDMwRjb2xvA2JmMQR2dGlkAw--/RV=2/RE=1502171552/RO=10/RU=http%3a%2f%2fmagissues.farmprogress.com%2fWAL%2fWF12Dec07%2fwal001.pdf/RK=0/RS=SdfBrDIIwAkzhAWvFv2MROwMdZk-

Either this lock and dam wasn't on the appropriations list, or the money to actually do the project was never appropriated.