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Posted on 09/03/2005 6:36:23 PM PDT by A. Pole
Efforts to drain New Orleans hit another snag Friday as the Army Corps of Engineers discovered that it could not buy new pumps to replace those damaged by the flooding.
Massive pumps capable of draining the city like those that have been keeping New Orleans dry for decades are no longer made and would have to be specially ordered, a process that would take too long, said Col. Richard Wagenaar, the senior corps official in New Orleans.
Instead, repair crews will have to dry out the existing pumps, which could take up to a week, before repairing them with replacement motors and parts and begin pumping water back into Lake Pontchartrain. The repair job could prolong efforts to drain the city, about 80% of which is submerged.
"These pumps are so big, you can't buy them off the shelf. You have to make them, and we don't have time for that," said Wagenaar, who spent about an hour Friday escorting President Bush around the levee damage at the 17th Street Canal.
The city, much of which is below sea level, relies on a network of 22 pumps to keep water out. Army engineers now believe eight pumps are underwater.
The latest wrinkle illustrated the enormous complexity of draining the city, which for more than 200 years had gradually built up an elaborate system to keep itself dry.
Even with the setback, Wagenaar said, the city could be drained in three to six months, mainly because engineers may finally be able to get to the largest pump station, at the end of the 17th Street Canal, as early as today.
[...]
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
I suspect that they always have been custom made. My husband used to order pumps like that 25-30 years ago, and he always had to have them custom made. I doubt that pumps qualify for your buggy whip remark.
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Actually, this may fall under the jurisdiction of the levee board. According to a friend who knows, each Parish down there has it's own levee board and they all pay themselves in the 6 figures. And they NEVER fix the levees -- they just mow the grass on top. However, in the past couple of years, the levee boards (which have taxing authority) have bought themselves a casino, an airplane, and have made numerous "investments" with tax money that have nothing to do with flood control. Furthermore, the break occurred in a spot that was the most recently repaired. I think it's spelled c-o-r-r-u-p-t-i-o-n.
it seems that a lot of the large pumps are electric, though...why I don't know.Reliability, vibration, won't run as slow as 83 RPM while providing useful amounts of torque?
Like this?That's not going to fit in their pump room ...
No - - - - You don't. Trust me.
"Get those lazy good for nothing people that sit on there ass all day and collect welfare money from taxpayers and form a bucket birgade"
Marvelous idea!
"You know, a million Chinese would probably have this part of the problem over with in a couple, three days."
Why not a million or so of the illegals already here? We keep hearing how industrious...let 'em show us.
It's a good thing we Texans can handle a 25 foot storm surge!
They could just put a paddle wheel on that and throw the water out.
They could just put a paddle wheel on that and throw the water out.They've already tried that technique - about 100 years ago now! Turns out its not very efficent ...
Wait for the next hurricane.
That was simple.
Quick! Get some crack Indian H1-B design engineers on it, and bring in some illegals from Mexico to do the manufacturing Americans refuse to do.
they have to get huge diesel generators out to the pumping stations.
I was thinking about having the railroad come in with two or three, (or more) diesel engines and parallel them together and have the electric company lay a line and hook them up to the pumps. A quick fix but it might work.
sounds to me like this could take an extra week.
Typical PTO pumps put out 1000 gallons/minute at 150 psi, which is plenty sufficient to get the water over a typical levee. I KNOW this type of pump can do this because I'VE SEEN IT in EXACTLY this type of situation (pumping out a low-lying area over a Mississippi River levee).
Take 500 or 1000 of them and pretty quickly you have significant pumping capacity (or do you consider 1,000,000 gallons per minute "insignificant")
Look. I've SEEN this exact kind of setup IN USE pumping flood water over Mississippi River levees. The setup I watched had about 100 tractor-driven 1000 gpm pumps, and they ran 24/7 for days on end. I'm SURE that in South Lousiana they can come up with 1000 tractors and pumps, and possibly more.
Or do you consider 1,000,000 gallons per minute trivial.
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