New York Times<br />August 15, 2005<br />Drought Threatens Crops and Shuts River in Midwest<br />By ALEXEI BARRIONUEVO<br />CHICAGO, Aug. 14 - Rick and Rhonda Richards drove two and a half hours last Monday from Nashville to Metropolis, Ill., to hit the slot machines there, only to find that Harrah's riverboat casino had closed two nights before for the most unexpected of reasons: low water levels on the Ohio River. A drought ravaging parts of the Midwest this summer had left the boat nearly on the river bottom, making it difficult to board and disembark. <br /><br />The couple had planned the two-day trip a month before to celebrate their 33rd wedding anniversary. But they never got word that Harrah's had closed because of low water - the first time that has happened since the casino opened in 1993. "We didn't know what was going on," Mr. Richards said. "The parking lot was empty, the town was empty."<br /><br />As the worst drought since 1988 has deepened across parts of the Midwest, low-water levels are doing more than just inconveniencing gamblers. They are turning parts of the Mississippi and Ohio Rivers into virtual sandbars, causing towboats and barges to run aground and delaying shipments of petroleum products, coal, chemicals, agricultural goods and road-paving materials....<br /><br /> Entire article
