NATCHEZ— At 7:30 a.m. Monday morning, Lee Jones got a call from his banker telling him that the Mississippi River was projected to rise to near 60 feet in mid-May.

Flood-stage waters are good for few, but Lee was especially devastated by the news.

Jones owns J.M. Jones Lumber Company in Natchez, which sits dangerously close to the banks of the river. The threat of high-water levels means the possibility of no business at all.

“We still don’t believe it,” he said. “Many people are going to lose everything from this rise.”

The lumber company has been in Jones’ family since it was started in Ferriday in 1911, and the high river levels also managed to thwart the 100th anniversary of the company, vice president and Lee’s son Howard Jones said.

“We were planning on having the celebration on May 20,” he said. “That just so happens to be the day the river is supposed to crest, so we have to move back the celebration.”

With a short deadline to work on, Lee and the workers at his company immediately began planning work on raising the levees around the company.

“We started working on everything at 12:30 p.m. that day,” he said. “We haven’t stopped since.”

Howard said the lumber yard’s location has always caused problems, and this is not the first time the levees around the facility have had to be raised.

“We raised them in 1997 and 2008 when the river got really high,” he said. “They stood between 58 and 60 feet this year before we started working on them.”

Howard said the goal is to raise the levees to 63 feet to help battle the river.

“This projected level of 60 feet is a beast,” he said. “There has never been one this high, so we want to have as much leeway as we can.”

To create the extra three to five feet of height needed on a levee that stretches three quarters of a mile in length, Howard said trucks full of dirt have been delivering non-stop to the facility.

“We had around 70 truck loads of dirt on Monday and we are expecting around 150 loads (today),” he said.

While crews are working to add to the height of the levee, others are also bagging sand for the levee addition, Howard said.

Once the height of the levee is complete, Howard said large visqueen covers will be draped over the dirt to stop water from compromising the structure.

“From there we use all the sandbags to put on top of the covers to weigh it down and keep it on,” he said.

Howard said the mill also faces an additional challenge of creating two separate levees, because there is a creek running through the middle of the facility.

“We basically have a northern and a southern levee,” he said. “We have to wall them off separately and leave the creek running into the river.”

Howard said since the two separate levees form basins that can trap water, the company also has to worry about hard rains coming in and filling them up.

“If that happens we are going to have to get in there and pump the water out back over the levee,” he said.

Howard said too much water on the levee structure can cause it to fail, so keeping the visqueen covers on them is an important job.

“We are going to have people watching the levees 24-7,” he said. “They are going to be checking for any problems that may arise.”

Howard also said even if the river does not get as high as it is projected, a stagnant crest can also cause problems for the company.

“Last year the crest lasted over a month,” he said. “When the water sits that long it makes the levee weak and it can fail.”

With an endless list of possible problems, Howard said his company is doing everything it can to raise the levee.

“This is a nightmare,” he said. “After three straight years of flooding, we need a break.”

When the river reaches 55 feet, Howard said the company will be forced to shut down operations until the level drops back down to 55 feet or lower.

“We have a machine here that literally shakes the ground when it is in operation,” he said. “With the ground that wet, the machine shaking would turn the foundation into jelly.”

Howard said the company will still be able to operate on lumber they currently have in storage during the shutdown, but if the river stays at crest for a long period of time, money could be lost.

“We are going to have to maintain all our fixed costs and we are also having to pay to raise the levee,” he said. “If it stays up long enough, we are going to continue paying these costs without the money coming in.”

Howard said the company produces between 80,000 and 90,000 square feet of board a day, and a breach in the levee would take that down to nothing.

“It would close everything up that we have,” he said. “We would lose everything.

The river sat at 48 feet Friday evening. Flood stage is 48 feet.

The river is expected to rise above flood stage by Sunday and will continue to rise to near 60 feet by May 20, the National Weather Service has predicted