City workers Monday were rigging pipe from a portable pump at the Clay Street floodgate to a nearby city-operated pump house to remove seepage from a section of the floodwall near the gate.

The portable pump will replace pumps housed in an elevated building on the floodwall by the Clay Street entrance to the river on City Front that recirculates floodwaters back into the river during high water periods.

Vicksburg Public Works Director Garnet Van Norman said the contractor hired by the city in 2015 to install new pumps has been having some problems with them, “and I believe they’ve got them worked out now, but we can’t take any chances.”

While the crew was working on the pipe, another crew began setting out the materials to install the Levee Street floodwall in anticipation of the forecast 50.5-foot crest at Vicksburg March 17. The river was at 45.09 feet Monday; flood stage is 43 feet.

Van Norman said crews will slowly begin putting the wall up and expect to have it up by the weekend.

“The river is going to be at 49.7 feet by Sunday,” he said. “We’re going to go for the length of it (higher than 50 feet). You have to think of the worst.”

The effect of the floodwaters is already being felt across the county. Warren County Emergency Management director John Elfer said the Mississippi Department of Transportation still planned to close Mississippi 465, the direct route to the Eagle Lake community sometime Monday night.

The closure was discussed by MDOT Central District engineer Kevin Magee at a meeting of Eagle Lake residents Saturday.

“We’re expecting to keep it open all day Monday and let y’all get home from work, get your groceries, get whatever you need and get in,” Magee said Saturday morning. “We are told to expect the road to go under in the night Monday night.

“We will watch it, and we will close it when we have to close it. When the water goes down, we’ll clean it as quick as we possibly can. We will try and get it opened as quick as we can.”

Elfer said more county roads have been closed by high water: Thompson Lake Road, Chickasaw Road and Chickasaw Lane off North Washington Street, Pittman Road and Williams Road in Ford Subdivision, and Jackson Lane and Hardin Road in the Kings community.