kjb434 Posted August 30, 2005 Share Posted August 30, 2005 Similar approach to levee breaches in 93' in the midwest.I can see billions of federal money going to New Orleans and the surrounding areas and the Army Corps to rebuild this system and better.Just like Houston, HCFCD and the Army Corps received after Tropical Storm Allision.As a hydraulics and hydrology specialized engineer, I can't wait to see the projects proposed come out of this. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RedScare Posted August 30, 2005 Share Posted August 30, 2005 Here's an updated story on the levee breaches, with a photograph.http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9130254/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J.A.S.O.N. Posted August 30, 2005 Share Posted August 30, 2005 Similar approach to levee breaches in 93' in the midwest.I can see billions of federal money going to New Orleans and the surrounding areas and the Army Corps to rebuild this system and better.Just like Houston, HCFCD and the Army Corps received after Tropical Storm Allision.As a hydraulics and hydrology specialized engineer, I can't wait to see the projects proposed come out of this.<{POST_SNAPBACK}>I hope my city is taking notes on not only evacuation routes, but also what measures can be taken to save as much of the city as possible. Some of the systems developed can be adopted in our area. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Great Hizzy! Posted August 30, 2005 Share Posted August 30, 2005 Well, the sobering truth is that, although not destroyed, the New Orleans of all our lifetimes will never be the same again, and I fear the longterm economic affect on the city, which had been struggling to stay afloat for the previous 25 or so years. Entire neighborhoos ruined. Sections and sections of once stately communities raided of those historical structures. Those who already had little now completely empty.Billions and billions of dollars in damage, with the estimates growing and growing now that vital levies have been breached/comprimised.If you come across one of our friends from Louisiana or Mississippi here in town, keep a good thought in mind and be as courteous as you deem prudent. They could use some friends right now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RedScare Posted August 30, 2005 Share Posted August 30, 2005 More sobering news:The Times-Picayune is reporting that the French Quarter is now flooding. FoxNews is also reporting water entering the Quarter.Martial Law has been declared in Orleans, Jefferson and Plaquemines Parishes. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eelimon Posted August 30, 2005 Share Posted August 30, 2005 A meteorologist friend of mine said that it's possible that by this time next week they'll be trying to decide whether to rebuild New Orleans or abandon the city.Food for thought.<{POST_SNAPBACK}>From what the cable news stations are reporting it looks very bad. I would hate to think that Americans would lose their resolve and give up an abandon the city. In this day and age I would think that the will to build and fortify will prevail. It is foolish to think that New Orleans will go of the way of the abandoned city of ancient times. It will take an unthinkable natural or man made disaster of proportions unimaginable that will lead to abandonment of any city in the world today. I can imagine the Army Corp of Engineers building larger levies, or raising ground level to above sea level. Think of the preservation effort of older building. Moving entire city districts like the French Quarter 15 to 20 feet above what it is now, and at the same time think about how the city could be improved. If the cities elevation is raised certain neighborhoods that are not of historical importance could be improved with city planning. I think New Orleans is a fun city but it looks a little drab. A kind of drab that makes me feel depressed just looking at it. Such a drab feeling that would be greatly helped if all is scraped; meanwhile developers and city planers start over. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
editor Posted August 30, 2005 Author Share Posted August 30, 2005 I guy in my company is in a hotel on Canal Street (the W, I think. I'm not sure). He says the water is coming in and there are bodies floating in the lobby.Before that happened he says the looters came through last night on a rampage and all the guests ran to their rooms and locked the doors.MSNBC is reporting bodies coming in on the tide up Canal Street. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kjb434 Posted August 30, 2005 Share Posted August 30, 2005 yeah, It's getting worse.Just remember, in 1965 the city had an average of about 7 feet of water across the entire city. This was before ANY levees on the lakeside existed. The levees were built after that. The were aim to protect from a large category three storm figuring that any larger storm would destroy the city from wind.All the historical buildings have been flooded before. Most of the modern structures were built in the late 70s and early 80s just like in Houston. Mold is not an issue since water is always a problems. That's why I was so shocked how everyone is scared of mold in Texas and wondered why New Orleans never had the problem. Most of the lower homes and buildings have flooded if they are over 40 years old.To me the most critical thing is time. The national guard of Lousiana and assistance from Texas will need to get to work to get the pumps and levees fixed first. The the water can go down. As areas of the city start emerging from water clean up can begin. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pineda Posted August 30, 2005 Share Posted August 30, 2005 looters taking over French Quarter nowupdated story from MSNBC about evacuations Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RedScare Posted August 30, 2005 Share Posted August 30, 2005 "All day, rescuers were also seen using helicopters to drop lifelines to victims and pluck them from the roofs of homes cut off by floodwaters. The Coast Guard said it rescued some 1,200 people.New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin said hundreds, if not thousands, of people may still be stuck on roofs roofs and in attics, and so rescue boats were bypassing the dead."We're not even dealing with dead bodies," Nagin said. "They're just pushing them on the side." - from the Times-Picayune Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
citykid09 Posted August 30, 2005 Share Posted August 30, 2005 I hear that they paint the roof of the house black if the person is dead and red if they are hurt. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
editor Posted August 30, 2005 Author Share Posted August 30, 2005 I hear that they paint the roof of the house black if the person is dead and red if they are hurt.I remember something similar during Andrew, but they painted garages with big X's to mark that the house had been searched for survivors. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RedScare Posted August 31, 2005 Share Posted August 31, 2005 From the Times-Picayune website:"More canal breach flooding predictedTuesday, 6:35 p.m.Mayor Ray Nagin issued an urgent bulletin through WWL-TV at 6:30 p.m.Nagin said efforts to stop the flow of water at the breach on the 17th Street Canal are failing, which means the floodwaters will rise again.Nagin said the waters will soon overwhelm the pump, shutting it down. He said the water will rise to 3 feet above sea level - or 12-15 feet in some places of east Jefferson and Orleans parishes.Nagin has advised residents who have not already evacuated to do so as soon as possible." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dbigtex56 Posted August 31, 2005 Share Posted August 31, 2005 I've been thinking about merging all the New Orleans threads, but since so many were created by the editor, perhaps that would be unwise... My 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dbigtex56 Posted August 31, 2005 Share Posted August 31, 2005 Briiiiiiiiiiiicccccckkkkkkks! I need hundreds more old bricks to finish my walkway in my backyard. I might have to head over there once the water drains. It is a shame though that the oldest buildings seem to get it the worst.<{POST_SNAPBACK}>If New Orleans is going to be rebuilt, they'll want to use the original bricks to make repairs. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RedScare Posted August 31, 2005 Share Posted August 31, 2005 We just got a call here at the house from a friend who stayed in New Orleans through the storm. He somehow has escaped, and is driving to Houston. I'm sure I'll have some amazing stories to post tomorrow. Stay tuned. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ssullivan Posted August 31, 2005 Share Posted August 31, 2005 This whole story is truly amazing. One of my best friends and the girl he is dating flew over to New Orleans last weekend on one of Continental's last-minute weekend specials. Little did they know they were there for the last weekend in the city as it was before the big storm.What I can't believe are the numbers of people who stayed in their homes in New Orleans, Gulfport, Biloxi, and other coastal areas. What fools! At least most people did have the sense to heed the warnings and get out in time. I know there have been a lot of false alarms over the years but still, life is too fragile to risk staying behind in a storm like this one was. Now many people are going to have to not only deal with the loss of their homes and belongings but also the loss of friends and family members who chose to ignore the warnings and evacuation orders.As for the looters, I say leave them in the city with the rising floodwaters filled with sewage and chemicals and debris and snakes and everything else and let them fend for themselves. Natural selection has a way of weeding out the lowlife of the species. I have no sympathy for those people.I do hope, and believe, that the city will be rebuilt. But as others have said, it will never be quite the same, and there may be many residents who choose not to return. I've been wanting to visit New Orleans again for the last few years but haven't gone. Now I'm kind of sad I didn't, because who knows what things are going to be like once this is all over with. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
houstonsemipro Posted August 31, 2005 Share Posted August 31, 2005 New Orleans will never be the same if they decide to rebuilt the city. It will be twice as more poverty then it was before, and more crime in the city. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
arche_757 Posted August 31, 2005 Share Posted August 31, 2005 What makes you say that semipro? Perhaps if anything this disaster will (once things settle down) help New Orleanians(?) imbrace and help one-another to cope and forge through a tough time. After all towns and cities across the world have been through similar things before and rebuilt. It will take time, and government (federal - not state) to do it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
arche_757 Posted August 31, 2005 Share Posted August 31, 2005 What really gets me is how people in power fail to address issues like this until they have happend! Why didnt the Army Corps reinforce the levees around Lake P. and elsewhere around New Orleans? Why when experts predicted this would happen years ago wasnt the problem worked on (because they didnt really work on it did they?).Well hopefully this type of natural disaster wont be repeated - since there are other major cities around the country that are threatend by hurricanes - perhaps this disaster will help shake up the government into addressing these issues NOW and not after the fact (when its worthless)! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
houstonsemipro Posted August 31, 2005 Share Posted August 31, 2005 What makes you say that semipro? Perhaps if anything this disaster will (once things settle down) help New Orleanians(?) imbrace and help one-another to cope and forge through a tough time. After all towns and cities across the world have been through similar things before and rebuilt. It will take time, and government (federal - not state) to do it.<{POST_SNAPBACK}>I'm not talking against New Orleans. The reason I said it will be more poverty, cause New Orleans is one of the poorest cities in America today, and the people you seen on the streets today will triple. It will be more homeless on the streets then before.And the crime? The crime will skyrocket in the Big Easy. Take a look what's going on now. Looters shot a police officer in the head, cause the officer was trying to stop them from taking clothes, micowaves, knife wares from a store. Not only the officers, and the people have to deal with the disaster, they now have to deal with looters. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dbigtex56 Posted August 31, 2005 Share Posted August 31, 2005 We need to stop over reacting. Sure, some buildings will get damaged, but the city will not get destroyed. I've been sick of all the coverage on the news exaggerating how bad this is really is.The 30 feet of water thing will not happen. This gets me sick when people take this information and don't know what they are talking about. Every year in the spring time the Mississippi River reaches high on it levees from all the snow melt up north. The spillways are opened up to lower the river. Remember the big midwestern flood of '93? New Orleans and Baton Rouge were fine. The Lake Ponchartrain Levees can hold up to 18' surges. The 20-30 predicted surge will get buffeted down before they hit the citie portion of the lake. Don't for get there are tons of swamps to the west of Lake Ponchartrain and the on the north side to absorb this water before it breaches the levees. Sure, there will be flooding in the streets, but that happens all the time in major rains. I just don't see this being that bad. I just received phone calls from people all over south Louisiana. Power it out, but cell phones are still operating currenlty. I think the biggest appearance of damage will be window blowouts from the skycrapers (because the windows don't open). Trees will also be an issue, but that's in every Hurricane. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Dammit, you were right. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nmainguy Posted August 31, 2005 Share Posted August 31, 2005 We need to stop over reacting. Sure, some buildings will get damaged, but the city will not get destroyed. I've been sick of all the coverage on the news exaggerating how bad this is really is.The 30 feet of water thing will not happen.This gets me sick when people take this information and don't know what they are talking about. Every year in the spring time the Mississippi River reaches high on it levees from all the snow melt up north. The spillways are opened up to lower the river. Remember the big midwestern flood of '93? New Orleans and Baton Rouge were fine.The Lake Ponchartrain Levees can hold up to 18' surges. The 20-30 predicted surge will get buffeted down before they hit the citie portion of the lake. Don't for get there are tons of swamps to the west of Lake Ponchartrain and the on the north side to absorb this water before it breaches the levees.Sure, there will be flooding in the streets, but that happens all the time in major rains.I just don't see this being that bad. I just received phone calls from people all over south Louisiana. Power it out, but cell phones are still operating currenlty. I think the biggest appearance of damage will be window blowouts from the skycrapers (because the windows don't open). Trees will also be an issue, but that's in every Hurricane.<{POST_SNAPBACK}>Apparently you are one of many who don't know what they are talking about. Your entire post has been discounted. You spoke too soon. The levees have been breached. Man, you are beyond clueless. It was a cat 4 hurricane hitting a below sea level city. No amount of Happy Republican Talk will erase the fact that hundreds of thousands of lives have beeen altered forever. You don't see this as bad? Cell phones still operate because they are cell phones-you know, the ones that transmit over airwaves? "Trees will also be an issue..." Ya think??? Hopefully I'm off to NO tomorrow with the Red Cross, kjb. Would you care to join me or just hang back here in your little Republican fantasy land and pretend this is all a big ol' exaggeration? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
editor Posted August 31, 2005 Author Share Posted August 31, 2005 What really gets me is how people in power fail to address issues like this until they have happend! Why didnt the Army Corps reinforce the levees around Lake P. and elsewhere around New Orleans?I'd say they did a pretty good job building a levee system that stood up to a number of storms. It's hundreds of miles long and was built to withstand a category three storm. That's a pretty remarkable achievement. As for why it wasn't built to withstand a category five, I'd say that's impossible with current technology. We humans and our constructions are not invinciible. If mother nature wants to destroy something, it will. Why when experts predicted this would happen years ago wasnt the problem worked on (because they didnt really work on it did they?).Money. It's the sort of decision that's made on the local level. It will be interesting to see if anyone remembers this in the next election.Well hopefully this type of natural disaster wont be repeated - since there are other major cities around the country that are threatend by hurricanes - perhaps this disaster will help shake up the government into addressing these issues NOW and not after the fact (when its worthless)!"The government" is only as responsive as its citizens demand. If people demand better schools insteed of better levees, that's what happens. If people want more hospitals instead of more police, that's what happens. Choices have to be made. Lines have to be drawn. There are finite resources, and anyone who lives near the water knows they are at the mercy of the elements. That's why people buy flood insurance. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kjb434 Posted August 31, 2005 Share Posted August 31, 2005 nmainguy,1.) if you looked at my post and the date it occured, you would realized it was made prior to the levee breach.2.) The levee was designed for a Cat 3 and it held up that expected storm surge. The weakest part of the levee is the upper levels unless it is paved in solid concrete, but the environmentalist won't let the corps do that.3.) at the time of the levee construction, the corps believed larger storms would inundate the city with so much rain and wind that the levee would be useless. The rain water would do the flooding and not the surge. The wind damage would be so catastrophic that keeping the surge out wouldn't be worth it.4.) was I wrong, sure, if move my post up after the levee breach.5.) what does republican have to do with this? Does it bother you that I have a positive outlook on the situation. I would rather look upon the realities and how to solve this problem and get the city moving than constantly re-enforcing the doom and gloom. This isn't avoiding reality, this me accepting it and wanting to figure out how to solve it. 6.) how I'm getting involved? I'm putting my talents where I can use them. I actively participate in ASCE (American Society of Civil Engineers). This is the same group that performed the analysis to discover why the twin towers really collapsed (not from the planes hitting it either). ASCE will partner with the Army Corps to evaluate the flooding situation and help in finding solutions to the problem. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
midtown_resident Posted August 31, 2005 Share Posted August 31, 2005 breaking news on MSNBC - Superdome evacuees are being relocated to the Houston Astrodome...more to come. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
midtown_resident Posted August 31, 2005 Share Posted August 31, 2005 breaking news on MSNBC - Superdome evacuees are being relocated to the Houston Astrodome...more to come.<{POST_SNAPBACK}>Houston Chronicle http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/topstory2/3332869 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pineda Posted August 31, 2005 Share Posted August 31, 2005 I wonder how the evacuees will get here. The Governor of Lousiana said that they would take people out of NOLA if they could, but I-10 is broken up and totally unusable, so putting people on busses is one thing, but what roads will they be able to take to get here? Just wondering... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pineda Posted August 31, 2005 Share Posted August 31, 2005 Katrina refugees heading to Astrodome Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Great Hizzy! Posted August 31, 2005 Share Posted August 31, 2005 I'll have to take a minute to search for the link, but the Chronicle suggested that approximately 400 cruiser type buses (think of METRO's new MCI Park & Ride buses) will carry those refugees here. Those buses each seat roughly 54 people. That's 21,600 people, give or take a couple hundred depending on the actual capacity of the bus.No word yet on who would be supplying the fleet, though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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