Plans for a third riverboat landing in Kimmswick on Oct. 7 were put in dry dock. Almost literally.
Faced with near record-low Mississippi River levels, authorities agreed to cancel a visit by the American Duchess steamboat to the new port in Kimmswick.
“We knew the low water conditions would present some challenges for the boat and getting passengers off,” said Derrick Good, president of the Board of Directors of the Jefferson County Port Authority, which runs the port.
He said water levels in St. Louis were the lowest since December 1989 and were expected to continue dropping.
“What we didn’t anticipate was that the American Queen Steamboat Co. folks (visiting the area in advance of their boat’s arrival) noticed some metal coming out of the water at the docking area,” he said.
Good said the debris likely was the loading deck for the Lt. Robert E. Lee, a replica of a 19th-century steamboat that was moored in Kimmswick and operated as a restaurant from 2004-2006.
When its owner, Dan Francis, a former Imperial businessman, stopped making payments on the boat, the ownership reverted to four St. Louis men who had sold it to Francis and they moved it back to St. Louis. A Collinsville, Ill., man bought it at auction and had planned to move it to St. Charles, but it caught on fire on the St. Louis riverfront in March 2010.
“Several of us inspected (the port site) and (the Jefferson County Parks Department) went to work removing a lot of debris,” Good said. “Unfortunately, there was a large section of what we assume was the walkway that they could not remove using two tow trucks.”
He said Riverview Commerce Park LLC, which runs the commercial barge port at Herculaneum, helped enlist a tugboat to clear the debris.
“They were able to move it, but they couldn’t get it out,” Good said. “We’ll have to hire a firm that can get underwater to remove it. I think when they moved the Robert E. Lee, they just cut off the gangplank and dropped it into the river.”
The low Mississippi River levels made any landing iffy, but being unable to remove the debris led to the decision to keep the American Duchess moving south past Kimmswick, he said.
While Good said he doesn’t believe the American Queen Steamboat Co., which owns the American Duchess and three other vessels, has plans to make another stop in Kimmswick, the port hasn’t seen the last of their boats.
“We’re on track to see probably 12 to 15 stops a year from American Queen,” Good said. “They’re telling us everything went well, and they want to make us a regular stop next year.”
He said American Queen officials are taking the change in plans in stride.
“They deal with the river all the time,” he said. “They understand that unexpected events happen from time to time. I really feel bad for the people in Kimmswick. They had some cool stuff planned.”
As with the previous visits by the American Duchess on July 11 and the American Countess on Aug. 20, the city and its Historical Society had planned a welcome ceremony with music and demonstrations and had arranged for tour buses to take passengers to various sites in the area.
Owners of the Delta Queen, an excursion riverboat, have announced plans to base that vessel at the port in Kimmswick and move their corporate headquarters to the Old House in Kimmswick.
The boat is being restored in Houma, La., and officials have said COVID-19 and the recent hurricanes in the area have slowed the renovation of the steamboat.