LAKE CITY, Minn. — The Army Corps will begin weekly borings into Lake Pepin ice Tuesday to calculate when upper Mississippi navigation can resume. The 22-mile lake, backed up behind the Chippewa River delta near Wabasha, is always the final barrier to seasonal barge traffic. Ice thickness in recent years has ranged from 17 to 30 inches. Shippers need the information to schedule barge traffic.
Countdown to spring. Typically the first barges cut through the ice in the third week of March.