The 1993 Flood on the Mississippi River in Illinois Bhowmik, Nani G., Andrew G. Buck, Stanley A. Changnon, Robert H. Dalton, Ali Durgunoglu, Misganaw Demissie, Arlan R. Juhl, H. Vernon Knapp, Kenneth E. Kunkel, Sally A. McConkey, Robert W. Scott, Krishan P. Singh, Ta-Wei David Soong, et al., 1994 Illinois State Water Survey, Champaign, IL, ISWS MP-151 
This report on the 1993 flood on the Mississippi River in Illinois and on the lower reaches of the
Illinois River was prepared by the Illinois State Water Survey with assistance from the Illinois
Department of Transportation/Division of Water Resources and the Illinois Natural History Survey. The
report begins with a brief description of the physical setting of the Upper Mississippi River System,
including historical facts on climate, precipitation, hydrology, and floods. The 1993 flood is discussed
with regard to precipitation, soil moisture, stages, flows, levee breaches, and discharge through levee
breaches. Also discussed are impacts of the flood on social, economic, hydraulic and hydrologic, and
environmental aspects of the river and its residents. Impacts on water quality, the environment, and
public water supplies, including the beneficial and detrimental aspects of the flood, also are included.
The lessons learned from this flood focus on the performance of the levees, governmental responses,
the effects of flood fighting, change in stages due to levee breaches, flood modeling, and the lack of
information dissemination to the public on the technical aspects of the flood. These lessons point out
information gaps and the need for research in the areas of hydraulics and hydrology, meteorology,
sediment transport and sedimentation, surface and groundwater interactions, water quality, and levees.
The report presents a comprehensive summary of the 1993 flood as far as climate, hydrology, and
hydraulics are concerned.
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