New Orleans

[mmcirvin]

By this time tomorrow, the city of New Orleans may be gone. I'm sorry I never visited. If you live there, I hope you're getting out.

Comments

[pentomino.livejournal.com]

The Jesus freaks, of course, will assume it's God's retribution. Which is politically convenient for global warming deniers.

[mmcirvin.livejournal.com]

I look forward to Pat Robertson being an ass again.

It's still possible that the storm track may veer enough that the city isn't completely flooded. But I don't think it's the way to bet at this point. This is apparently a scenario that people have been worrying about, and trying to find ways to avert, for many years, but the will to build better storm protection for the city hasn't been there. I am happy that it sounds as if there's been adequate warning and officials are taking the threat extremely seriously.

[sunburn.livejournal.com]

I look forward to Pat Robertson being an ass again.

"still."

Hopefully the city will get nothing more than a decent splash of water, enough to kick their butts into doing something more permanent. I've got friends in NO, and my dad's whole family is in Metairie and outer NO.

[sunburn.livejournal.com]

Whether New Orleans is destroyed or not isn't a global warming issue. The city is lower than it was when first founded, and walls around it are higher, to keep the river and lake ponchartrain out. It's only a matter of time before downtown NO has 25 feet of water that have nowhere to drain, and that's got nothing to do with warming or sea-levels. Whether global warming, or the climatic change to go with it, has anything to do with the likelihood of a force 4-5 hurricane hitting NO, well, I leave that to the climate scientists and their magic 8-balls of doomsaying.

[mmcirvin.livejournal.com]

That's more or less correct; there seems to be a small historic correlation between strong hurricanes and global warming, but New Orleans is a pretty special case because of its peculiar geography, and it's been long known that something like this would eventually happen.

[sunburn.livejournal.com]

I visited my Dad today-- he grew up in Metarie and remembers the last major hurricane to hit New Orleans, which was 40 years ago. (Hurricane Betsy, which was Force 3 as it passed over NO.) He was 18 and recalls driving through the streets (and seeing odd little bits of localized damage to houses-- shingles and such torn off here and there, while other houses are untouched. His childhood home, where my grandmother still lives (and who is no doubt driving one of her daughters or grandkids up the wall right now with relentless proclamations of worry, as they have evacuated) is on a formation called Metairie ridge, and there are loads of drainage canals that run through her neighborhood, including one behidn her back yard. However, my dad says, Metairie Ridge puts Metaire above sea-level, but certainly not more than about 3-5 feet above it. He said that he'd never seen so much rain, and every drop that falls on the city has to be pumped out, period. (Hence the lovely tombs.)

I also asked him why he supposes that the city's in the state it's in, and he said that while it has always been below sea level, he figures it's the dredging of the shipping lanes in the river, and the establishment of an artificial shoreline, that is pretty much levied with normal or not-much-above-normal river pressures in mind.

Dad also mentioned there's a worst-cast scenario where a powerful hurricane can pass just east(?) of the city and the hurricane's cyclonic action can cause a storm surge on the lake, throwing brackish water all over Metairie, as if the seawater in NO wouldn't be enough. I didn't get far enough in your linked article to see if that was mentioned. But. Ugh.

If the city *is* still around next week or soon thereafter, take this as a stimulus to get down there. Our amphibian pal is an excellent host and guide, and there's plenty to enjoy even (especially?) if your goal isn't drunkenness or debauchery.

P.S. Is it wrong of me to want this thing to hit Galveston instead?