The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Omaha District, awarded a $58.3 million construction contract to Aptim Federal Services, LLC of Alexandria, Virginia, on December 23.
This contract is the first final repair contract to be awarded for the Missouri River Left Bank Levee Systems, which will allow USACE to begin repairing the levee system to its Congressionally authorized level in turn restoring the flood risk management benefits provided by the levee system.
The contract also uses a portion of the newly added $1 billion in contract capacity the Omaha District put in place following the March 2019 flooding.
Missouri River Levee System L-550 is the next levee system in line to have a final repair contract in place, with the contracting process already underway.
According to USACE, “on Missouri River Levee System L-575, a sixth breach in Northwest Missouri was closed Dec. 22, providing an initial level of flood risk management to the area behind this downstream portion of the levee. The aforementioned final repair contract will close the final remaining outlet breach on the L-575 levee system.”
“We continue to make progress towards our goal of having the Missouri River L-575 Levee System closed by spring. Closing another breach and awarding the final repair contract are two significant steps towards accomplishing this goal,” said Colleen Horihan the USACE Project Manager for the L-575 Levee Repair Project.
There are more than 500 miles of levees on the Missouri, Platte and Elkhorn rivers, and tributaries that experienced significant flood damage since March 2019. Due to the magnitude of damage along these levees, repair of the levee system efforts will take an extended period of time to complete, USACE said.