Why New Orleans Flooded

Newsmax ^ | Sept 13, 2005 | Phil Brennan

[chs68]

"No, we in the VRWC did it with our sub-orbital laser weapons. By heating the dirt with our partical beam laser, it caused the dirt to soften, thus releasing it's cohesiveness, and allowing it to melt, thus releasing the levee. Then, we at the VRWC HQ (see pic) popped the tops on some brews and HAW-HAWed over it all."

Wait a minute.

I thought I was a member in good standing of the VRWC. I paid my dues (which, by the way, went up this year), and I have attended the required number of meetings. I even have been instructed on the latest secret handshake.

I was told that our sub-orbital laser devices (not to be called "weapons" outside the confines of the VRWC) were ultra-Top-Secret.

Am I wrong? Is #1 still upset because I didn't compliment him on his tie at the VRWC Annual (Secret) Dinner?

[kjam22]

This is as crazy as when people were saying the Clinton administration bombed the Murrah Building.

[Fudd]

From the article: "In an earlier September 2 story the Journal noted that in Louisiana, coastal wetlands provide some shelter from surging seawater, but more than one million acres of coastal wetlands have been lost since 1930 due to development and construction of levees and canals. For every square mile of wetland lost, storm surges rise by one foot.

At 640 acres to the square mile, this means that NOLA was flooded by a 1600-ft tall storm surge....

Or yet another reporter went through public "education".

[Former Dodger]

Good post, WW.

Sometimes Sh%t Happens PING!

It's really interesting how much the MSM doesn't report.

[Mr. Jeeves]

Yep, there it is. Karl Rove's "Barge o' Doom" comes through for the Administration. ;)

[Happy2BMe]

NOLA - KATRINA pings.

(Sit down before you read - NOLA residents resisted Lake Ponchatrain repairs that would have likely prevented the disaster.)

====================================

Vital repairs for which a whopping $600 million had been appropriated by the federal government were stopped after residents of the Ninth Ward complained about the noise created by the repair project and sued to halt it.

[Jess Kitting]

According to Louis Farrakhan, the levees were deliberately destroyed in order to wipe out poor blacks in New Orleans. He said there was supposedly a big crater under one of the levees that could prove his theory.

I couldn't find the link to the article, or I would post it.

[Luis Gonzalez]

Before Hurricane Katrina breached a levee on the New Orleans Industrial Canal, the Army Corps of Engineers had already launched a $748 million construction project at that very location. But the project had nothing to do with flood control. The Corps was building a huge new lock for the canal, an effort to accommodate steadily increasing barge traffic. Except that barge traffic on the canal has been steadily decreasing.

In Katrina's wake, Louisiana politicians and other critics have complained about paltry funding for the Army Corps in general and Louisiana projects in particular. But over the five years of President Bush's administration, Louisiana has received far more money for Corps civil works projects than any other state, about $1.9 billion; California was a distant second with less than $1.4 billion, even though its population is more than seven times as large. -- Source

[NonLinear]

No.

I checked the math. Only 1,562 - 1,563 ft of storm surge due to the lost wetlands.

Can't believe you would exaggerate such an important statistic! 1,600 ft, indeed!

(c8

[NonLinear]

The Corps was building a huge new lock for the canal, an effort to accommodate steadily increasing barge traffic. Except that barge traffic on the canal has been steadily decreasing.

Maybe because the locks were shot? Just guessing on that one...

[Mad Dawgg]

"Why New Orleans Flooded"

Easy.

Gravity.

OK next question.

[jeffers]

WSJ probably has a good handle on what the witnesses say, but they're missing a couple of significant components.

1. The sat imagery in this thread:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1484919/posts

...show that east Orleans (east of the Industrial Canal) probably did not flood from topped levees in the Canal, and also indicate a significant surge was funneled west along the Intercoastal Waterway, part of which continued west, topping the western Canal levees and flooding a significant portion of northeastern downtown (corroborated by early news reports, but not later ones, as you;d expect from a short lived surge event topping levees but not breaching them),

...and the other part of which flowed south down the Canal, tearing the barge loose and putting it through the concrete wall. From the pictures, the barge currently sits southeast of the breach, indicating both its southerly and easterly velocity component when it breached the wall.

However, this does not explain two separate issues. One, why the entire area flooded so quickly (a quick over view of the area indicates the disparity in size between the Industrial Canal and the flooded areas of the Ninth Ward and St.Bernard's Parish, and two, the oft posted images showing water flowing OUT of St. Bernard into the canal, along with reports that this area filled so high that "we can't see the tops of the levees any more".

This thread:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1484668/posts

...indicates significant subsidence affected the levees on the northeastern edges of St. Bernards Parish, lowering what were supposed to be 17 foot levees to in some cases as low as 6.6 feet above sea level, as far back as 1999.

Per the WSJ article posted in this thread and others, officials are now trying to claim that Katrina washed away those low levee sections, through others as noted in the article above, admit that subsidence played a part years before the storm arrived.

Still looking for the failure mechanism for the 17th street canal, and the mechanism which allowed east Orleans Parish to flood.

Early assessments indicate that the 17th street levee was probably topped, based on a 0345 Monday report from Kenner that the canal NW of there (with walls the same height as the 17th street Canal) was full at that time.

Early assessments also indicate that east Orleans probably flooded from a heightened surge funneled between the seawalls north of St. Bernard's and south of east Orleans, but I also believe that there probably was a breach somewhere out that way because of the manner in which east Orleans flooded, early and full.

In any event, I'd like like to firm these two suppositions up, so if anyone comes across engineering or other reports that bear on the issues, a ping would be appreciated.

[ericthecurdog]

Ping and bookmark.

[AppyPappy]

There were reports out of New Orleans that local authorities intentionally blew up a section of the levee to save the French Quarter and homes in wealthy neighborhoods. One must believe the witnesses who were there and heard the blast.

Yeah.........sure. They just happened to have an azzload of explosives lying about.

[Wonder Warthog]

"WSJ probably has a good handle on what the witnesses say, but they're missing a couple of significant components."

Good additional information----thanks. I'm sure that this will all be accounted for in the "final" Corps of Engineers report. The Corp has some pretty damned good staff engineers and scientists up at Vicksburg.

"...indicates significant subsidence affected the levees on the northeastern edges of St. Bernards Parish, lowering what were supposed to be 17 foot levees to in some cases as low as 6.6 feet above sea level, as far back as 1999."

Yeah, I saw that thread. Someone needs to ask some VERY POINTED QUESTIONS of the St. Bernard Parish Levee Board.

[hoosiermama]

Meth Lab?

[Nov3]

As the hurricane rolled into New Orleans, scores of boats broke free or sank. In the Industrial Canal, the gush of water broke a barge from its moorings. It isn't known whose barge it was.

Something tells me that no one is going to come forward and say it was their barge that was not properly secured and caused the levee breech.

[Little Ray]

'Cause its a coast city below sea level?

[Nov3]

There were several on TV that heard a blast. It will be intersting to see what happened. I really don't think Nagin had his act together good enough to do something that required that much foresight.

[Wonder Warthog]

"Something tells me that no one is going to come forward and say it was their barge that was not properly secured and caused the levee breech."

I doubt that it was a question of "properly secured". I suspect a LOT of barges got "broken loose" by the winds and storm surge, even though they WERE "properly secured".

I saw one video clip where the Corps of Engineers was trying to "break loose" a barge with a massive crane, so they could use it in fixing the levee breaks. The barge had been broken loose and washed well up on shore, and they were using the on-board crane and THREE tugs to try to pull the barge back into "floatable depth water".