Several trade groups and municipalities in Mississippi failed to revive their challenge to the US Army Corps of Engineers’ operation of a spillway that opens into the Mississippi Sound, after a federal appeals court ruled Thursday that the plaintiffs failed to show imminent harm.
The Bonnet Carré Spillway is only opened in response to major flooding events that threaten to overtop the Mississippi River levee system, so the agency doesn’t schedule the releases. It therefore doesn’t need to apply for an incidental take permit for the bottlenose dolphins potentially harmed during these emergency events because the Marine Mammal Protection Act ...