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Government may blame environmental groups for hurricane damage to New Orleans Rhett A. Butler, mongabay.com September 16, 2005  The fault of environmentalists? Some in the Justice Department would like to make you think so. Photo courtesy of NOAA An email obtained by The Clarion-Ledger suggests federal officials appear to be seeking proof to blame the flood of New Orleans on environmental groups. Cynthia Magnuson, a spokeswoman for the Justice Department, told The Clarion-Ledger Thursday she couldn't comment "because it's an internal e-mail." Jerry Mitchell, author of the The Clarion-Ledger article, notes that the email may be the result of someone noticing the Sept. 8 issue of National Review Online which
The corps settled the litigation in 1997, agreeing to hold off on some work until an environmental impact could be completed. The National Review article concluded: "Whether this delay directly affected the levees that broke in New Orleans is difficult to ascertain." The problem with that conclusion? The levees that broke causing New Orleans to flood weren't Mississippi River levees. They were levees that protected the city from Lake Pontchartrain levees on the other side of the city. When Katrina struck, the hurricane pushed tons of water from the Gulf of Mexico into Lake Pontchartrain, which borders the city to the north. Corps officials say the water from the lake cleared the levees by 3 feet. It was those floodwaters, they say, that caused the levees to degrade until they ruptured, causing 80 percent of New Orleans to flood. This news brief uses information and quotes from The Clarion-Ledger. More hurricane coverage A Category 4 hurricane could cause a storm surge of as much as 25 feet in Tampa Bay, according to a University of Central Florida researcher who is looking at the risks Florida cities face from tidal surges and flooding. Number of Category 4 and 5 hurricanes has nearly doubled over past 35 years September 16, 2005 The number of Category 4 and 5 hurricanes worldwide has nearly doubled over the past 35 years, even though the total number of hurricanes has dropped since the 1990s, according to a study by researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology and the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR). The shift occurred as global sea surface temperatures have increased over the same period. The research appears in the September 16 issue of Science. Hurricane Katrina to cost Louisiana fisheries $1.1 billion September 13, 2005 The Louisiana Department and Wildlife and Fisheries' preliminary estimates indicate a potential $1.1 billion loss in retail fisheries revenue over the next year and an additional $150 million loss in oyster revenue in the second year due to Hurricane Katrina damage. Hurricane could hit San Diego September 8, 2005 San Diego has been hit by hurricanes in the past and may be affected by such storms in the future according to data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). While a hurricane in San Diego would likely produce significantly less damage that Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans, it could still exact a high cost to Southern California especially if the region was caught off guard. Personal account of hurricane destruction along Mississippi Gulf Coast September 6, 2005 The following is an eyewitness account of hurricane destruction along the Mississippi Gulf Coast. Included is information on plans to provide pro bono services from out of state lawyers to the storm victims, many of whom will need assistance in dealing with insurance companies, relief bureaucracies, and possibly personal or small business bankruptcies in the aftermath of the storm. New Orleans Aquarium, Zoo update Surviving animals from the New Orleans will find new homes according to aquarium spokeswoman Melissa Lee. Despite escaping Hurricane Katrina with little physical damage, the Aquarium of the Americas in New Orleans suffered significant loss of animal life when the facility's emergency generator failed and made conditions unlivable for most its animals. Hurricanes getting stronger due to global warming says study August 29, 2005 Late last month an atmospheric scientist at Massachusetts Institute of Technology released a study in Nature that found hurricanes have grown significantly more powerful and destructive over the past three decades. Kerry Emanuel, the author of the study, warns that since hurricanes depend on warm water to form and build, global climate change might increase the effect of hurricanes still further in coming years. Environmental problems worsened Hurricane Katrina's impact August 31, 2005 The loss of coastal marshlands that buffer New Orleans from flooding and storm surges may have worsened the impact of Hurricane Katrina. In the past, the region's wetlands have served as a natural buffer that slows hurricanes down as they come in from the Gulf of Mexico and helps protect New Orleans from storms. But all this has changed. Aerial photos of Hurricane Katrina destruction: NOAA posted online more than 1450 aerial images of the U.S. Gulf Coast areas that were decimated by Hurricane Katrina. News index | RSS | News Feed Advertisements: Organic Apparel from Patagonia | Insect-repelling clothing |
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