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Today is 105th anniversary of the 1900 Storm (Galveston, Texas)
Galveston County The Daily News ^ | 8 September 2005 | Staff Reports

Posted on 09/08/2005 7:24:59 AM PDT by Racehorse

Today marks the 105th anniversary of the unnamed hurricane that destroyed this island city, killed somewhere between 6,000 and 12,000 people and inspired one of history’s most amazing feats of civil engineering.

[. . .]

. . . The highest house in the city was at an elevation between eight and nine feet.

. . . By the peak of the storm, no part of the island remained dry.

“In reality, there was no island, just the ocean with houses standing out of the waves which rolled between them,”

[. . .]

Pictures taken after the storm show empty streets. No people. No animals. No trees. No personal belongings. Only piles of debris that buried families beneath the remains of their homes.

[. . .]

Historians contend that between 10,000 and 12,000 people died during the storm, at least 6,000 of them on Galveston Island. More than 3,600 homes were destroyed on Galveston Island, and the added toll on commercial structures created a monetary loss of $30 million, about $700 million in today’s dollars.

[. . .]

The two civil engineering projects leaders decided to pursue — building a seawall and raising the island’s elevation — stand today, and are almost as great in their scope and effect as the storm itself.

Along with building a seawall, engineers recommended the city be raised 17 feet at the seawall and sloped downward at a pitch of one foot for every 1,500 feet to the bay.

{. . .]

The solution was to dredge the sand from Galveston’s ship channel and pump it as liquid slurry through pipes into quarter-square-mile sections of the city that were walled off with dikes.

By 1911, 500 city blocks had been raised, some by just a few inches and others by as much as 11 feet.

The most apparent of Galveston’s efforts to prevent a repeat of 1900’s devastation is the Seawall that travels just more than 10 miles and was built in six sections in a period of almost 60 years.

The wall got its first real test in mid-August of 1915, when a hurricane of severity comparable to the 1900 Storm blew across the island.

While much of the city was flooded and most of the structures outside the protection of the original wall were destroyed, those behind it fared well.


TOPICS: Government; Miscellaneous; News/Current Events; US: Texas
KEYWORDS: cityplanning; civilengineering; disaster; galveston; gulfcoast; hurricane
[The above] are excerpts from special report published by The Daily News on the 100th anniversary of the 1900 Storm. The whole section is available at www.1900storm.com
1 posted on 09/08/2005 7:25:02 AM PDT by Racehorse
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To: Racehorse

And while President Bush was not yet born, it was HIS FAULT!


2 posted on 09/08/2005 7:26:43 AM PDT by highlymotivated (If American ever falls, a STINKING LIBERAL will be behind it.)
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To: Racehorse

Are you suggesting that Bush is 105 years late in sending FEMA in?


3 posted on 09/08/2005 7:27:34 AM PDT by evolved_rage (I didn't think so, but a 'Rat would.)
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To: Racehorse

BTTT


4 posted on 09/08/2005 7:27:55 AM PDT by Fiddlstix (This Tagline for sale. (Presented by TagLines R US))
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To: highlymotivated

He held back FEMA and the troops. He just doesn't like Texans.


5 posted on 09/08/2005 7:28:13 AM PDT by Conspiracy Guy (Warning.... Contents under pressure....If you don't like what I say, don't read it !)
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To: highlymotivated

Even his mother wasn't born.

Wow! That man is really dangerous.


6 posted on 09/08/2005 7:28:23 AM PDT by netmilsmom (Prayers for victims of Katrina)
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To: Racehorse
There is a great book, Isaac's Storm, which describes this hurricane.
7 posted on 09/08/2005 7:28:46 AM PDT by white trash redneck (Everything I needed to know about Islam I learned on 9-11-01.)
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To: Racehorse

It happened during President McKinley's watch - who just happened to be a REPUBLICAN!


8 posted on 09/08/2005 7:30:58 AM PDT by texianyankee
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To: netmilsmom

You should see the Dubya clones that we're raising at the VRWC HQ (The Cave). Man, they REALLY go after those moonbats we feed em. Pretty intense to witness.


9 posted on 09/08/2005 7:31:20 AM PDT by highlymotivated (If American ever falls, a STINKING LIBERAL will be behind it.)
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To: texianyankee

DAMMIT! He SHOULD have had his weather eye in the sky up! CURSE HIM!


10 posted on 09/08/2005 7:32:11 AM PDT by highlymotivated (If American ever falls, a STINKING LIBERAL will be behind it.)
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To: Racehorse

But this can't be...we all know that hurricanes are caused by SUV's and Bush's refusal to sign the Koyoto Treaty !!!


11 posted on 09/08/2005 7:32:13 AM PDT by Moby Grape
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To: Racehorse

The slate shingles blowing in the wind decapitated and maimed most who tried to flee. Gruesome storm. Katrina aspired to be this storm.


12 posted on 09/08/2005 7:33:11 AM PDT by Mrs. Shawnlaw (Rock beats scissors. Don't run with rocks. NRA)
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To: Racehorse
Alas, the type of improvements they did to Galveston, TX will never happen in New Orleans given the environmentalist wackos and the political corruption in the state.
13 posted on 09/08/2005 7:33:21 AM PDT by RayChuang88
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To: white trash redneck
Isaac's Storm was a great read. Some of the structures mentioned are still here, most aren't.

The Bishop's Palace, for example, remains.

14 posted on 09/08/2005 7:34:30 AM PDT by Michael Goldsberry (an enemy of islam -- Joe Boucher; Leapfrog; Dr.Zoidberg; Lazamataz; ...)
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To: highlymotivated

>>You should see the Dubya clones that we're raising at the VRWC HQ (The Cave). Man, they REALLY go after those moonbats we feed em. Pretty intense to witness.<<

LOL!


15 posted on 09/08/2005 7:35:23 AM PDT by netmilsmom (Prayers for victims of Katrina)
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To: Racehorse

Using Karl Rove's Patented Time Machine, Bush went back to 1900 and started global warming before the automobile was invented, just to annoy Al Gore decades later. That wascal. Gotta love 'im!


16 posted on 09/08/2005 7:47:24 AM PDT by laz (They can bus 'em to the polls, but they can't bus 'em out of the path of a Cat 5 hurricane.)
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To: laz

Yes, our Overlord, Herr Rove, is quite the inventor. His Liberal Neural Synapsis Mindlink (LNSM) is coming out soon and will allow us to control more of the wandering liberal sheeple's minds than we already do!


17 posted on 09/08/2005 7:55:39 AM PDT by highlymotivated (If American ever falls, a STINKING LIBERAL will be behind it.)
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To: white trash redneck

Without the warning system of today, I'm surprised more people did not die.


18 posted on 09/08/2005 8:12:19 AM PDT by Skinn_dogg
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