Mississippi River reopens after barge groundings near St. Louis

Reading Time: 2 minutes

Published: December 16, 2013

,

CHICAGO, Dec 16 (Reuters) – The Mississippi River reopened to commercial barge traffic near St. Louis on Monday following a 36-hour closure for emergency dredging after several barges hit ground in the major shipping channel plagued by low water in recent weeks, industry sources said.

The river at St. Louis was expected to remain near its current level for the next week but then recede by nearly two more feet, according to the latest National Weather Service forecast, so shipping through the busy port may remain difficult.

The U.S. Coast Guard reported at least four groundings over the weekend, including one in which barges briefly broke loose from a tow. A section of the river south of the Port of St. Louis was found to be too shallow so the Coast Guard closed the area to navigation while the Army Corps of Engineers dredged the channel to deepen it.

Read Also

Detail from the front of the CBOT building in Chicago. (Vito Palmisano/iStock/Getty Images)

U.S. grains: Soybean futures set two-week high on US weather worry, soyoil rally

Chicago Board of Trade soybean futures touched a two-week high on Friday on worries that heat may threaten U.S. crops and expectations that the country’s biofuel policy would boost demand for soyoil, analysts said.

“Three of the incidents were bump-and-go but there was one tow which lost several barges. They were able to regain them with no damage done, but these are all just side effects of the low water,” said Coast Guard spokesman Colin Fogarty.

Grain shippers, who rely on the Mississippi River and its tributaries to move grain from Midwest farms to export facilities near the Gulf Coast, have been loading as much as 25 percent less grain on barges for weeks to avoid groundings.

Some 60 percent of all U.S. corn, soybeans and wheat exit the country via Gulf Coast terminals.

“We’re down to nine-foot drafts through St. Louis. When things are good we can load 12-foot drafts going through St. Louis but we’re down to nine-foot drafts now. That’s 600 tons less grain per barge,” said a barge broker.

Spot barge freight costs at St. Louis eased slightly on Monday as milder weather was expected to limit ice buildup this week, preventing a further drop in river levels. Also, some rain was forecast for the area later this week.

Still, rates at St. Louis were seasonally higher than normal and well above rates further south where low water was not a concern.

Spot freight costs on the Mississippi River at St. Louis were 475 percent of tariff on Monday, down from trades as high as 500 percent on Friday. Spot rates in the Memphis-to-Cairo stretch of the river just south of St. Louis were just 275 percent of tariff.

Freight costs are quoted as a percent of benchmark rates set in 1976. The benchmark rates are higher at points further from the Gulf but the daily costs are adjusted based on logistical and other factors.

The St. Louis river gauge reading was at a minus-2.27 feet on Monday afternoon. It was forecast to remain around minus-2.1 feet for the next week then recede to a minus-4.1 feet a week later, according to the National Weather Service.

Markets at a glance

explore

Stories from our other publications