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Topic: Hurricane Katrina
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Randy Stankey
Film God
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Posts: 6539
From: Erie, Pennsylvania
Registered: Jun 99
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posted 08-29-2005 12:46 AM
The way I understand it, a whole bunch of levees were built around New Orleans about 100 years ago. They worked to keep out the flood water. The problem is they worked TOO well!
New Orleans was at sea level at one time or, at least, a lot closer. Over the years, the levees back-filled with silt and debris from the floods. Every year, they were repaired. They got built higher and higher. The city now sits in a bowl shaped depression outlined by 100 years of piled up silt and back fill from where people have built up the levees.
Now, if they had left well enough alone 100 years ago, the city would periodically flood BUT the silt from the receeding waters would have kept the land nearly level. Furthermore, Lake Poncetrain and the surrounding bayous would act as a damper against flooding. The excess water would have flooded the swamps where it would have done relatively little damage.
This time, instead of acting like a buffer, the lake will act like a breaking dam. The floods will overfill Lake Poncetrain and it will spill over into the city. Then, the levees will begin to erode and eventually fail. When that happens, it's bath time.
The ironic part (If this isn't ironic enough!) is that there are pumping stations all around the city to keep the water out. However they are all electric powered. When the hurricane hits, the electricity is sure to go out. No electricity means no pumps.
The storm is sure to rip down all the power lines in its path. City authorities have a gambit to play: Do they cut power before the storm or do they leave it up until the storm takes it down? Taking out the power before hand saves possible damage and lives when the high tension lines hit the ground. It also leaves people without power that COULD have saved their lives. It's a hard call... No matter what you do, you're going to lose some lives because of it.
Hurricane Katrina is the third or fourth largest storm on record since records have been kept. It is the WORST thing to hit the Eastern U.S. coast since Hurricane Camile in 1969. The second worst since then was Hurricane Andrew that hit just recently.
In terms of destruction, I'm expecting this one to be as bad as the tsunami in Indonesia. The difference being that WE had advance warning. 150-200 MPH winds and record storm surges ON TOP OF high tide will literally be like the proverbial "Finger of God"! This one isn't going to just flood New Orleans and surrounding areas. It's going to change the geography of the Gulf of Mexico!
This is the kind of storm that we'll never really be able to tell how bad it was. Winds of 150 MPH will destroy the instruments used to measure them. The only thing we'll really have to measure it is sattellites and Doppler radar. However, even with all that technology, the BEST way to tell what the weather is like is to stick your head out the window and look. The only problem is that if you do, you're likely to get your head ripped off!
I know I'm talking about a worst-case scenario but, seriously, I think this is goig to be pretty bad no matter HOW you slice it!
This is one time when I hope I'm wrong!
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