The Corps of Engineers wants contractors to rebuild a levee it deliberately breached as quickly as possible. Senior Project Manager Dennis Abernathy says conditions for repairing the Birds Point Levee in southeast Missouri are almost ideal.

The Corps blasted three large holes in the levee last year to relieve flood pressure on Cairo, Illinois. The Mississippi River poured through the breaches and flooded 130,000 acres of southeast Missouri farmland. The Corps says rebuilding the levee will cost up to $20-million.