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According to FEMA, Hurricane Katrina is now considered:
The worst natural disaster in the history of the United States of America
Many people have lost literally everything and they need our help!
Please donate to the Hurricane Katrina relief efforts.
August 29, 2006
Expert Looks Back On Katrina Disaster
The Army Corp of Engineers' official position is that the levees are "largely at, or better, than pre-Katrina levels." But as New Orleans sinks and the oceans rise, how can we come up with a solution to stop a repeat of Katrina?
ABC
August 29, 2006
Engineering New Orleans' future
There is no doubt that the flood defence system was inadequate: the levees were breached.
BBC
August 29, 2006
Katrina’s Real Lesson
Though President Bush declared on Saturday that Hurricane Katrina exposed “deep-seated poverty” in America, the disaster isn’t ultimately a story of poverty or of race, but of the greatest failure of civil engineering in American history.
City-Journal.org
August 29, 2006
Experts Offer Rebuilding Perspectives on "Katrina: One Year Later"
Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis experts discuss rebuilding Katrina in terms of data back-up for businesses; green housing for those affected by natural disaster; and cities at risk for natural disasters.
Newswise
August 29, 2006
Stronger levees offer little security
Despite significant improvements to levees and floodwalls in New Orleans, if Hurricane Katrina hit again, the city would not be fully protected.
ContraCostaTimes.com
August 2, 2006
Floodgates could raise New Orleans rain flood risk
Flood defenses meant to protect New Orleans from hurricanes could lock rain in the city and put some areas 5 feet (1.5 metres) under water during a tropical storm, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said on Wednesday.
AlertNet.org
March 15, 2006
Univ. researcher helps model Katrina
In Vicksburg, Mississippi, there lie two levees about one-third the size of a football field, a model of the levees in New Orleans before they collapsed because of Hurricane Katrina. A team of researchers began testing the model this week
Diamondback Online
March 15, 2006
Video of New Orleans 17th Street Levee Model Illustrates IPET Preliminary Findings
Made by researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, the video illustrates the preliminary findings from the March 10, 2006 IPET status report to the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) review committee.
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
March 15, 2006
Engineers: A test in 1985 predicted levee break
Scientists working on an independent study of a floodwall that collapsed during Hurricane Katrina said Monday that a government test 21 years ago predicted the wall could fail.
AP via USA Today
March 8, 2006
Louisiana delegation studies flood control systems in the Netherlands
The beleaguered engineers trying to shore up the city's flood protection say they learned a major lesson during a tour of Dutch levees and floodgates: It's unfair to compare projects here to those in the Netherlands, where the government has spent billions of dollars on flood control.
AP via SignOnSanDiego.com
March 8, 2006
Levee Fixes Falling Short, Experts Warn
Two teams of independent experts monitoring the $1.6 billion reconstruction project say large sections of the rebuilt levee system will be substantially weaker than before the hurricane hit.
Washington Post
February 21, 2006
Panel Urges Corps to Study Oversight of Levees
The Army Corps of Engineers investigation into the flooding of New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina is overlooking one of the most important causes: organizational failures, according to an outside engineering group working officially with the corps.
New York Times
February 17, 2006
U.S., Dutch join forces on rebirth of New Orleans
A rebuilt New Orleans might contain dikes thick enough to double as parks and a futuristic zigzag-shaped building with hanging gardens to symbolize the city's rebirth after Hurricane Katrina.
NorthJersey.com
February 17, 2006
Barge A Contentious Symbol of Hurricane Katrina
Almost six months after Hurricane Katrina, a mammoth red barge, an enduring symbol of the storm, still sits in the middle of what's left of the Lower 9th Ward.
USAToday
February 21, 2006
New Orleans rebuilding plan takes shape
Long-awaited plans to rebuild New Orleans and compensate hundreds of thousands of hurricane victims took shape on Monday as Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco announced details of a program that would give homeowners up to $150,000.
Washington Post
February 3, 2006
Could Engineers Have Known How Much Pressure the New Orleans Levees Could Withstand?
Could engineers have known ahead of time exactly how much pressure the levees protecting New Orleans could withstand before giving way? Is it possible to predict when and under what conditions material wear and tear will become critical, causing planes to crash or bridges to collapse? A study by Weizmann Institute scientists takes a new and original approach to the study of how materials fracture and split apart.
Newswise
January 31, 2006
Investigators Gain Access to Levee for Soil Test
It took a special agent of the Louisiana state attorney general's office and some bureaucratic sparring, but members of an independent team of engineering investigators won access on Tuesday to the site of a major levee breach from the Army Corps of Engineers.
New York Times
January 15, 2006
Canal failures blamed for toll
Nearly 600 people who died because of Hurricane Katrina might have survived had flood walls on two New Orleans canals not collapsed, a Knight Ridder analysis of where bodies were found indicates.
Star-Telegram.com
January 14, 2006
Engineers Race to Fix New Orleans Levees
Ravaged last year by one hurricane and slapped by the fringes of another, the city faces a 2006 storm season that begins in less than five months _ not much time to repair the tattered ramparts that keep New Orleans from being swallowed by the sea.
The Associated Press
January 12, 2006
Debate builds around rebuilding
A debate has been raging for months about whether to allow residents to return to the most flood-prone areas of the city.
USA Today
January 12, 2006
Canal gates planned before storm season
The Army Corps of Engineers will use temporary gates to close off three canals in New Orleans and will import stronger clay from Mississippi to help rebuild the St. Bernard Parish levee along the Mississippi River-Gulf Outlet before hurricane season begins June 1, corps officials said Tuesday.
nola.com
January 9, 2006
Rebuilding Gulf flood defences as levees only scorned as ‘a fool’s gamble’
Besides providing some $2.9 billion to enable the Army Corps of Engineers to continue storm and flood repairs and to begin reconstruction along America’s badly-hit Gulf Coast, the newly enacted Gulf Opportunity Zone Act provides for funding to accelerate studies required to determine appropriate flood protection measures for the future.
CIOB International News
January 9, 2006
New Orleans flood protection gets upgrade – but not in time for next hurricane season
Five months before the deadline of 1st June 2006 for restoring the New Orleans levee system to the Category 3 storm protection status it held at the time of the Hurricane Katrina onslaught last August, the White House agreed in mid-December to rebuilding the system to Category 4 standards.
CIOB International News
December 30, 2005
Majority of New Orleans deaths tied to floodwalls' collapse
The bodies of at least 588 people were recovered in neighborhoods that engineers say would have remained largely dry had the walls of the 17th Street and London Avenue canals not given way - probably because of poor design, shoddy construction or improper maintenance - after the height of the storm.
KRT Wire
December 30, 2005
Search for weak link in Big Easy's levees
Engineers scrutinize pilings as residents wait to rebuild once the 475-mile system is strengthened.
The Christian Science Monitor
December 27, 2005
Levees Weakened as New Orleans Board, Federal Engineers Feuded
When the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and New Orleans levee officials joined forces in July 1985 to protect the city from a long-feared hurricane, the two agencies could not agree on how to proceed.
KTLA
December 27, 2005
Report Revises Katrina's Force
The National Hurricane Center released a summary report on Katrina this week that downgraded the storm's intensity at landfall in Louisiana on Aug. 29 from Category 4 to Category 3. Estimates of Katrina's power are expected to play a central role in the ongoing investigations into what failures led to the catastrophic flooding of New Orleans.
Washington Post
December 19, 2005
More than three months later, New Orleans still in harm's way
With only six months to go before the next hurricane season, the effort to restore protection against another disaster is dogged by problems.
KRT Wire
December 16, 2005
Levee design flaw still elusive
While the excavation last week of sheet piling near the 17th Street Canal breach confirmed Army Corps of Engineers records about the depth of the floodwall foundation, forensic engineering teams say the findings will have little impact on their investigation into the levee failures that flooded much of New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina.
nola.com
December 12, 2005
Rumor of levee dynamite persists
Preliminary evidence shows shoddy engineering, poor maintenance and politics led to the massive failure of the levee system that was supposed to keep New Orleans dry.
nola.com
December 12, 2005
Gulf Coast Resurrection Rests on Who Pays
Only the federal government has pockets deep enough to pay for a massive reconstruction effort. But there is a significant difference of opinion over whether _ and if so, how _ the government should raise the money.
Washington Post
December 9, 2005
Evidence points to man-made disaster
Experts say the New Orleans flood of 2005 should join the space shuttle explosions and the sinking of the Titanic on history's list of ill-fated disasters attributable to human mistakes.
nola.com
December 2, 2005
Engineer discusses structural failure in Katrina, other mishaps
earning from past failures is an important part of the design process for future structures, engineering professor Henry Petroski said during a Voices of Discovery lecture Nov. 29. He also discussed engineering aspects of the New Orleans levee failures during Hurricane Katrina.
Elon University
December 2, 2005
Flaws in levee base cited
Floodwalls along the 17th Street and London Avenue canals in New Orleans were designed to hold even if they were overtopped with water. Instead, a storm surge as low as 10.5 feet during Hurricane Katrina caused them to fail, according to a team of Louisiana researchers examining the New Orleans levee failures.
2theadvocate.com
December 2, 2005
Gravity played role in New Orleans' bridge failures
Sir Isaac Newton did a number on the Interstate 10 bridges in New Orleans, according to a team of researchers at the University of Missouri-Rolla that helped document some of the damage caused by Hurricane Katrina.
PhysOrg.com
December 2, 2005
New Orleans Levee Was Doomed; Report Blames Army Corps of Engineers
The floodwall on New Orleans' 17th Street Canal levee was destined to fail long before it reached its maximum design load of 14 feet of water because the Army Corps of Engineers underestimated the weak soil layers 10 to 25 feet below the levee, Louisiana's forensic levee investigation team concluded in a draft copy of a report expected to be released next week.
NewhouseNews.com
November 29, 2005
New Orleans may need Cat-5 protection
A common theme emerging in the debate about rebuilding hurricane-hit New Orleans is it should have a flood protection system to withstand Category 5 storms.
Washinton Times
November 25, 2005
Long before flood, New Orleans was prime for leaks
There is growing evidence the New Orleans flood-control system sprang leaks in countless other locations around the city. Even if no levees had collapsed, parts of New Orleans still would have flooded, engineering reports indicate.
post-gazette.com
November 25, 2005
LEVEES: Peer Review Panel Named
The American Society of Civil Engineers has named a 13-member review panel formed at the request of the U.S. Dept. of Defense to provide continuing, expert, peer-review of investigations into the performance of the New Orleans hurricane protection systems.
ENR
November 18, 2005
Senate Hearing Focuses on Repairing Levees in New Orleans
It is clear that there were multiple causes for the levee failures in New Orleans, but researchers need to gather more data to better understand what they were and how to rebuild properly.
Newswise
November 21, 2005
Red Tape Added to Levee Failure
Navigating the twisted bureaucratic turf that investigators say contributed to the levee failures that swamped New Orleans can produce some surprises.
nola.com
November 16, 2005
Restoring New Orleans Takes Team Effort and Federal Help
Speakers also said the city’s vulnerability is not merely a local problem but is a manifestation of national issues with aging infrastructure and suspect engineering.
ENR
November 14, 2005
Architects Envision New Orleans Rebuilding
Not since the Nazi blitz of London or the bombing of Hiroshima have architects and urban planners seen a project on par with resurrecting this hurricane-ravaged city, according to Michael Willis, who has designed an airport terminal in San Francisco and a 750 million-gallon water treatment plant in Los Angeles
Guardian Unlimited
November 14, 2005
Engineers work to repair levees by 2006
Engineers may not have time to rebuild all 350 miles of battered levees in the New Orleans area before the next hurricane season, but they plan to shore up the structures enough to withstand another storm.
HappyNews.com
November 11, 2005
Investigations of New Orleans levees mounting
A federal prosecutor said Thursday his staff is pursuing tips about corruption relating to the building and maintenance of levees that broke during Hurricane Katrina.
KATC
November 9, 2005
City Turns from Rescue To Reconstruction
Contractors began driving sheet pile to build a cofferdam around a temporary plug at New Orleans’ 17th Street Canal on Nov. 7, setting up for permanent repairs less than a week after experts studying levee performance in Hurricane Katrina questioned those same levee designs in testimony to Congress.
ENR
November 9, 2005
Louisiana mulls legal action on failed levees
Louisiana prosecutors are investigating the failure of the levees around New Orleans to determine if bungled engineering and construction of the flood protection system warrants legal action.
ABC News
November 9, 2005
Inquiry to Seek Cause of Levee Failure
The Louisiana Attorney General said Tuesday that he had begun examining why the New Orleans levees failed during Hurricane Katrina, partly to increase the chances that people who lost their homes will be compensated for their losses.
New York Times
November 3, 2005
Why New Orleans levees failed
If the only thing standing between you and a powerful storm surge is a levee made of sand and seashell fill, you might consider moving.
Christian Science Monitor
November 2, 2005
Engineers Fear Levee Repairs Not Enough
Repairs to New Orleans' levees may not be enough to protect people moving back to the devastated city if another hurricane comes before the tropical storm season ends this month, engineers said Wednesday.
AP
October 12, 2005
nquest Finds Signs of Soil Movement at Breach Sites
Engineers studying the performance of New Orleans’ levees during Hurricane Katrina say there are signs of soil mass movement at two of the five Orleans Parish sites where floodwalls failed, but no evidence that the walls were overtopped.
ENR
October 12, 2005
Corps finishes pumping out New Orleans
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said Tuesday that it has finished pumping out the New Orleans metropolitan area, which was flooded by Hurricane Katrina six weeks ago and then swamped again by Hurricane Rita.
AP via Seattle P-I
October 12, 2005
Katrina floodwaters not as toxic to humans as previously thought, study says
The floodwaters that inundated New Orleans immediately following Hurricane Katrina were similar in content to the city’s normal storm water and were not as toxic as previously thought, according to a study by researchers at Louisiana State University.
EurekAlert
October 10, 2005
New Orleans begins study of levee breeches
The central issue they grappled with: Did Katrina overwhelm the city's flood defenses with a torrent they weren't designed to contain? Or did faulty construction or maintenance cause them to burst open at water levels well within their capacity?
The World LInk
October 10, 2005
Engineers Probing Levee Failures
The researchers, plan to take cues from the disaster in New Orleans and apply them to the design of levee systems across the country.
All Headline News
October 7, 2005
Engineers: New cause of New Orleans flood
Much of the city flooded not because water rushed over the tops of levees, but because two of the storm barriers that ring New Orleans actually shifted and then collapsed, a team of independent engineers said Friday.
AP Wire
October 7, 2005
Soil failure caused floodwalls to collapse, investigators believe
Hurricane Katrina's storm surges were never high enough to go over the walls of two canals whose failure caused massive flooding in western and central New Orleans, investigators have determined.
KRT Wire
October 7, 2005
UB scientists head to New Orleans
Days after Hurricane Katrina hit, research teams from UB's Multidisciplinary Center for Earthquake Engineering Research (MCEER) were dispatched to the Mississippi coast to conduct structural analysis and remote sensing of damage to large structures.
University at Buffalo
October 7, 2005
Katrina work goes to officials who led Iraq effort
Top officials who managed U.S. reconstruction projects in Iraq have been hired by some of the same big companies that received those contracts and which are now involved in a rush of deals to rebuild after Hurricane Katrina.
Reuters
October 5, 2005
Engineers respond to Katrina aftermath
A panel of civil and environmental engineering experts discussed solutions to the Hurricane Katrina relief efforts Tuesday.
The Chronicle Online
October 5, 2005
To Track Damage and Decisions, Scientists Head to New Orleans
On Oct, 3, MCEER and UB will send three teams of researchers to New Orleans to study damage to structures and lifelines; transportation and hospital decisions and remote sensing. Another team will travel to New Orleans on Oct. 19 to study environmental and health issues.
Newswise
October 5, 2005
Levees draw researchers to New Orleans
Civil engineers from the University of California, Berkeley, have gone to New Orleans to study why the levees failed after Hurricane Katrina.
Inside Bay Area
October 5, 2005
Cornell Creates Web Site To Help Hurricane Relief
Researchers collecting information about the disaster, such as damage done to infrastructure and communities, as well as demographic and economic data, are now able to overlay that quantitative record — called a Geographic Information System (GIS) — onto a map of the Gulf Coast.
The Cornell Daily Sun
October 3, 2005
Dutch offer New Orleans know-how
After Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans and the Gulf Coast on Aug. 29, U.S. authorities and the Army Corps of Engineers accepted a Dutch offer of knowledge, expertise and aid to combat the water damage and flooding.
World Peace Herald
October 3, 2005
Agency Pumps Floodwaters Out of Big Easy
The Army Corps of Engineers pumped many of the remaining floodwaters out of the city Saturday as tens of thousands of residents continued returning to dry neighborhoods to check on houses and reopen businesses.
ABC News
October 3, 2005
Ground Shifted Beneath Levees
The rapid sinking of the Louisiana coast may have lowered New Orleans levees and contributed to their failure after Hurricane Katrina, resulting in the city's catastrophic flooding, engineers and other experts say.
KTLA
October 3, 2005
Water goes, questions stay
Hurricane experts from Louisiana State University and others have already raised questions about the Corps' initial assertions that floodwalls in two key drainage canals at 17th Street and London Avenue were overtopped by water from Lake Pontchartrain that eroded away their earthen bases.
Newsday.com
October 3, 2005
Construction Played Role in Storm Damage
An initial engineering review found that most of the wood-frame houses that survived the storm's 130 mph gusts held up because of little things: plenty of nails, metal straps attaching rafters to frames and bolts anchoring frames and porches to concrete.
Guardian Unlimited
September 23, 2005
'Smart Concrete' Could Improve Levees
The failure of levees in the wake of Hurricane Katrina points out the need for new technologies to strengthen levees and monitor their reliability, according to Deborah D. L. Chung, Ph.D., a University at Buffalo materials scientist and inventor of "smart concrete."
Newswise
September 23, 2005
Flood walls in New Orleans were ‘structurally flawed’
Scientists claim faulty construction or poor maintenance led to breaches rather than the walls being over-topped by water.
New Scientist
September 23, 2005
Wetland Restoration in Jamaica Bay: Will Katrina Threaten Its Funding?
Should New Yorkers sacrifice the city’s last remaining wetlands to help the citizens of Louisiana and the Gulf Coast regain theirs?
Gotham Gazette
September 23, 2005
A race to shore up weakened levees
The first raindrops from Rita's outer bands began falling in New Orleans yesterday afternoon as engineers performed an 11th-hour bid to strengthen the city's weakened flood protection system and water began seeping into the lower Ninth Ward.
Boston.com
September 23, 2005
Survey: Katrina shifted Dauphin Island; homes swept away
Hurricane Katrina shifted part of Dauphin Island landward and cut a mile-wide canal across its western tip, completely destroying a long line of resort homes that faced the Gulf of Mexico, a geological survey shows.
AP Wire
September 23, 2005
Will the levees hold?
The Army Corps of Engineers say the levees can handle just 6 inches of rain and a storm surge of 10 to 12 feet.
The Christian Science Monitor
September 21, 2005
Researcher: Toxic Flood Lifts Lid on Common Urban Pollution Problem
Broken sewers, flooded industrial plants and dead bodies are all likely to blame for poisoning the waters being drained from New Orleans.
Newswise
September 21, 2005
More Water Woes Imminent for New Orleans Says Safe Water Expert
The toxic flood waters from the streets of New Orleans being pumped into the Mississippi River and Lake Pontchartrain could spell further environmental troubles for the wetlands near New Orleans and the Gulf of Mexico, according to a safe water expert at Atlanta’s Spelman College.
Newswise
September 21, 2005
professor Smith saw threat to New Orleans
Princeton professor James Smith, a flood expert in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, has told his students for years that the lower Mississippi River — and New Orleans in particular — were vulnerable to catastrophic flooding.
Daily Princetonian
September 19, 2005
Bentley Now Offers Free CAD Software in Nine Languages to Students and Instructors
Bentley Systems, Incorporated today announced that BE Careers Network has expanded its offer of free MicroStation PowerDraft CAD software to all students and instructors to include versions in the following nine languages.
Business Wire
September 19, 2005
Protecting New Orleans to cost billions
Given enough money, engineers agree that they could eventually build a system of levees and other flood control structures sufficient to protect New Orleans from another Katrina or even a stronger hurricane.
FortWayne.com
September 19, 2005
New Orleans Levees Destined to Fail?
Journalist John McQuaid says the engineers who designed that system of levees did so without the benefit of today's advanced technology. Anything Anything stronger than that, the levee system could not be guaranteed to protect the city.
VOA
September 19, 2005
Greens Blocked Plan That May Have Saved New Orleans
A U.S. Army Corps of Engineers project designed to prevent a Category 5-hurricane-storm surge from filling Lake Pontchartrain and flooding New Orleans was blocked by environmentalists intent on preserving “natural water flow” in 1977.
Humane Events Online
September 16, 2005
URI experts weigh in on hurricane
Faculty members at the University of Rhode Island have been conducting research dealing with issues related to Hurricane Katrina.
Good Five Cent Cigar
September 16, 2005
Assessing the damage from Katrina
The MCEER team, primarily sponsored by the National Science Foundation, focused on damage to bridges and commercial structures in affected areas as a first step toward identifying how earthquake-engineering expertise can be applied to designing structures that will better withstand all kinds of hazards, including hurricanes, earthquakes and terrorist attacks.
University at Buffalo
September 13, 2005
Breaking Down Katrina
University professors explain the cause and ongoing difficulties of the hurricane’s destruction.
The Michigan Daily
September 13,2005
Dartmouth Flood Observatory tracks the aftermath of Katrina
Researchers with the Dartmouth Flood Observatory at Dartmouth College have been working with state and federal officials, along with representatives from NGOs, to help map and analyze the flooding that has occurred as a result of Hurricane Katrina.
Dartmouth News
September 13, 2005
Professors bring expertise to hurricane panel
Professor Rachel Bratt thinks there are five "key truths" about Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath. And She was joined by Urban and Environmental Policy and Planning Professor Ann Rappaport, Civil and Environmental Engineering Professor Paul Kirshen, Sociology Professor Paula Aymer, and University College Senior Fellow Marjorie Reedy.
The Tufts Daily
September 12, 2005
What Will It Take to Safeguard New Orleans?
The success of levees in a restored New Orleans will depend partly on the resilience of other civil engineering, and on wetlands between the city and the Gulf of Mexico.
New York Times
September 12, 2005
NIEHS launches website with information for assessing environmental hazards from Hurricane Katrina
The National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) created the website to provide the most up-to-date data to public health and safety workers on contaminants in flood waters, infrastructure and industry maps, as well as demographic information for local populations.
EurekAlert
September 12, 2005
Removing debris in southern Mississippi could take 5 years
It may take as long as five years to get rid of the mountains of garbage that Hurricane Katrina created in Mississippi's southern counties, waste management experts said.
FortWayne.com
September 12, 2005
Napolitano says New Orleans needs to be rebuilt for sake of history
New Orleans should be rebuilt, Gov. Janet Napolitano said Thursday.
Arizona Daily Sun
September 12, 2005
Don't Shore Up Levees, Get Rid of Them, Enviros Say
The New Orleans flooding in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina was due to government's failure to shore up the levees keeping the water at bay, according to many critics, but not to the environmental groups gathered in Washington, D.C., Friday.
CNSNews.com
September 9, 2005
Faculty Confer on Katrina Aid Efforts
UC Berkeley Staff Introduce National Alliance to Pool Professors’ Resources in Event of Emergency.
Daily Californian Online
September 9, 2005
Floods can cause damage to a home's structure
The prognosis for many houses, which have been buried in water as high as 10 feet for as many as 10 days, is not good, structural engineers say.
montgomeryadvertiser.com
September 9, 2005
New Orleans Lacked Lesson Florida Learned in 1928
But those lessons weren't adopted in New Orleans... and the levee system isn't designed for the slim chance that a disastrous event will occur.
The Ledger
September 9, 2005
UC Berkeley professor examines Katrina
Robert Bea, a civil engineering professor at UC Berkeley, characterizes Katrina's effect as a "predictable surprise."
Contra Costa Times
September 9, 2005
Professors discuss policies, response to hurricane crisis
Karl Linden, assistant professor of civil engineering, focused on the toxicity of the stagnant water now covering New Orleans.
The Chronicle Online
September 9, 2005
Debating Flood Control Raises Urban Rebuilding Questions
The scope of reconstruction may still be unclear in the wake of Hurricane Katrina and the subsequent flooding, so the early rebuilding focus has turned to flood control. The debate about what should have been done—and what should now be done—has already begun.
Architectural Record
September 9, 2005
Cornell Web Site Will Aid Gulf Coast Recovery
A Web site being developed at Cornell University will give reconstruction workers and researchers access to detailed information on the status of critical infrastructure in communities along the Mississippi coast, tied in with existing information about the location of roads, bridges, public and private buildings and even economic and demographic data about the region.
Science Daily
September 9, 2005
In Katrina's aftermath, a rare opportunity for fieldwork
When it comes to fieldwork during this time of year, Princeton University Professor James Smith and his students have their proverbial bags packed and ready to go at a moment's notice.
Packet Online
September 9, 2005
In the near term, levee system is only choice
Someday, in the future that engineer Nik Katopodes is working to bring about, a levee will sense when it's in danger of collapse and signal floodgates to open and relieve the pressure.
The Plain Dealer
September 9, 2005
City had evacuation plan but strayed from strategy
As the floodwaters recede, serious questions remain about whether New Orleans and Louisiana officials followed their own plans for evacuating people with no other way out.
Houston Chronicle
September 7, 2005
Leaky Lake O dike not likely to fail in storm, officials say
Water managers say the dike's leaks are nothing like the gaping breach in the levee surrounding Lake Pontchartrain, which sent a deluge into New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina ripped through the city last week.
The Palm Beach Post
September 7,2005
Hurricane flags posted
David Prevatt, a professor of civil engineering who specializes in wind and water damage, said the United States is not spending nearly what it needs to on research and protection from hurricanes.
New York Newsday
September 7,2005
Building a Better Levee
The Army has been investigating permanent solutions, according to Al Naomi, project manager for the Army Corps of Engineers, and is scheduled to begin a feasibility study in 2006.
Wired News
September 7, 2005
With nature's help, a solution to flooding
London has built floodgates on the Thames. Venice is doing the same on the Adriatic. Japan is erecting superlevees. Bangladesh has built concrete shelters on stilts as emergency havens for flood victims. Experts in the United States say the projects are worth studying for inspiration about how to rebuild New Orleans.
International Herald Tribune
September 7, 2005
After Waters Recede, Next Step May Be to Raise Level of New Orleans
When civil engineers start planning for rebuilding New Orleans, there are few historical examples to guide them. Duke University engineering professor Henry Petroski says the closest example he can think of is the 1900 Galveston, Texas, hurricane which, like Katrina, left a city partially underwater.
AScribe
September 7,2005
Figuring out the future of New Orleans
When New Orleans emerges from Katrina's floodwaters and begins to plan for its future, how will engineers and planners make the new city less susceptible to wind and water?
CentreDaily.com
September 7,2005
Experts: Katrina rebuilding will be worse than 9-11
The destruction Hurricane Katrina caused was so catastrophic some experts say rebuilding the area will be more difficult than reconstruction after the Sept. 11 attacks.
Foster's Online
September 7, 2005
Experts: Post-Katrina Rebuilding Costly
No one knows how much it will cost to rebuild the streets, the highways and the bridges devastated by Hurricane Katrina. One thing for sure, however: It will cost more than any other post-disaster reconstruction effort in U.S. history.
Washington Post
September 2, 2005
Engineers to Study Hurricane Damage in Mississippi
A reconnaissance team from University at Buffalo's Multidisciplinary Center for Earthquake Engineering Research will travel next week to Gulfport, Biloxi and other areas of Mississippi devastated by Hurricane Katrina to determine the specific causes behind the failures of large engineered structures, primarily commercial buildings.
Newswise
September 2,2005
Government Saw Flood Risk but Not Levee Failure
The response will be dissected for years. But on Thursday, disaster experts and frustrated officials said a crucial shortcoming may have been the failure to predict that the levees keeping Lake Pontchartrain out of the city would be breached, not just overflow.
Wilmington Star-News
September 1, 2005
Why city's defences were down
The Louisiana coastline may have been so badly damaged by the hurricane because manmade engineering of the delta has led to erosion of natural defences, according to the American Society of Civil Engineers.
Guardian Unlimited
September 1, 2005
Katrina costly, but not as big as expected
The actual toll to life and property isn’t immediately known, which caused Kim Mish, a professor of civil engineering and environmental science, to hold off on his analysis. What is known is the hurricane’s eye landed east of New Orleans. That meant damage to the vital economic port, while significant, wasn’t as severe as it could have been.
The Norman Transcript
September 1, 2005
Army trying to plug New Orleans’ broken defences
The engineers’ work on the breaches is focused on slowing the flow of water into at least five regions, which are filling up like bowls.
New Scientist
September 1, 2005
New Orleans' levees become part of the problem
The levees are earthen embankments that stand between the city and Lake Ponchartrain on one side and the Mississippi River on the other. When they are overtopped by floodwaters, they tend to quickly erode and then to give way, allowing water to rush into the city they are supposed to protect.
SunHerald.com
September 1, 2005
Hurricane cleanup could take months, years
New Orleans could be underwater for quite a while, according to experts, and the oil fields in the Gulf of Mexico might be under repairs for years.
ZDNet
August 30, 2005
Hurricane Katrina Data May Improve Safety
Information about ground-level wind velocity, wind-force effect on buildings and evaluation of supposedly wind-resistant structural retrofits is being gathered and analyzed now in hopes of strengthening building codes to meet the reality of what nature's fury can inflict.
Discovery Channel
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