Mighty Mississippi

I was home, in Vicksburg, for Easter, before the river started is rise but everyone knew it was on it's way. In the mean time a boat had hit the MS river bridge, a mile north of my parents' house and 2 of the barges sunk, one close to the bridge and the other, right in front of our house. Here are some pictures of the process, it was really cool to see. It took them over a week to pull the barge up, at around $100,000, I guess it was worth salvaging:)

This is the view from our back porch, this is the first barge on the scene and the buoys south of the barge are the markers for the sunken barge.
A close up of the buoys..
Next, they needed to pump sand out of the hoppers of the sunken barge to relieve some of the weight and hopefully get some leverage underneath it. It's amazing to think that that much sand can accumulate in the hoppers over a week. They pumped for 3 straight days....
Just perspective of how big the boats are...notice the little fishing boat tied up to the barge....
Sand going down river....
Zoomed out from the house....
Brought in another barge w/ more cranes for lifting power...
Mostly out of the water now....
Sunken barge no more.....

I'm not sure how they get it from here to a dry dock for repairs but they did, somehow....

You never know what you are going to get on the mighty MS, it's amazing....