Residents in Memphis, Tennessee, are bracing for potentially historic floods Tuesday when the Mississippi River is expected to crest at a near-record level and Louisiana appears to be next in the path of the bloated river.
One of the Memphis residents in peril was Latisha Bowles. Her neighborhood had been swallowed by flood waters but so far but her home was the last one at the waters' edge.
"It wants to come up here, but I've been praying every day it don't," Bowles told CNN affiliate WMC Monday. "I got three kids and I'm not ready to move out of my house over this."
Memphis is one of the many cities now menaced by the Mississippi River. The river level stood at 47.8 feet Monday evening and is expected to crest at 48 feet, forecasters said.President Barack Obama signed a disaster declaration for the state of Tennessee Monday, which will help direct federal aid toward recovery efforts in areas hit by severe storms, flooding and tornadoes since early April.
The Mississippi is the highest it's been at Memphis since 1937, when it crested at 48.7 feet -- 14.7 feet above flood stage. That flood killed 500 people and inundated 20 million acres of land, said Col. Vernie Reichling, the Corps' Memphis District commander.
The river covered the lowest parts of the city's historic Beale Street and had already forced about 400 people from their homes Monday, Memphis Mayor A.C. Wharton Jr. said. Another 1,300 remained in low-lying areas, he said.
Many others know what Tennesseans are going through as eight Midwestern and Southern states were dealing with or bracing for historic flooding.
The latest flooding in the Mississippi and Ohio river valleys is largely the byproduct of torrential rains throughout the region. Over one two-week stretch, there was about 600% more precipitation than usual, forecasters said.
In Louisiana, the river's crest was expected to begin arriving next week. So far, 21 parishes have issued emergency declarations ahead of expected flooding, said Gov. Bobby Jindal. He said 400 National Guard troops were active helping prepare for the flood.
In Missouri and southern Illinois, flooding continued even though the Mississippi and Ohio river crests have moved south and despite efforts by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
Last week, the Corps intentionally breached a levee in Missouri as part of its effort to reduce the pressure on other levees, flooding 130,000 acres of agricultural land over the objection of state officials and some farmers.
"I'm very sad. I look at that and I don't have a home," Marilynn Nally said, pointing to her flooded family farm. "I feel like we're having to suffer for somebody else."
The Corps also opened a spillway north of New Orleans on Monday in an effort to calm the rising Mississippi River.
The weather appears to be working in the flood fighters' favor. Only minimal rain is expected over the coming days, with daytime temperatures forecast to be in the upper 80s and 90s through Thursday, at which point the water levels should begin to creep back down.
But for some, especially in Louisiana, the threat of the floods was frightening.
"I went through Katrina," said Lynn Magnuson, a New Orleans resident who submitted footage of the flooding to CNN iReport. "I would not wish flooding on anyone, and this city is the last place on Earth that needs any more high water."
