BELLEVUE- Rebuilding Offutt Air Force Base from the devastating March 2019 flood is going to take longer and cost more than engineers first thought, military and congressional sources say.

Rep. Don Bacon, the former commander of the base’s 55th Wing, said he’s been told by Offutt officials to expect the original estimate of nearly $800 million, calculated within six months of the flood, to rise by more than one-third.

“They’re saying they’re about $300 million short,” Bacon said. That would bring the total to about $1.1 billion.

He worked successfully to secure $100 million in the National Defense Authorization Act, which President Joe Biden signed.

Bacon said he will work to get the rest of the funding next year.

Officials at Offutt’s 55th Wing agreed that costs would be higher, though they declined to specify an amount.

Costs are rising, in part, because the initial estimates were done very quickly and with incomplete information about what reconstruction would need to include, according to Lt. Col. Chris Conover, who is leading Offutt’s reconstruction effort. He also blamed the COVID-19 pandemic, which is pushing up the costs of both supplies and labor — a case of one disaster compounding another.

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