A federal court judge cleared the way Friday for the Army Corps of Engineers to face trial on claims that defects in its Mississippi River-Gulf Outlet destroyed wetlands and turned the navigation channel into a funnel for storm surge. Continue at Nola.com.
Reznet, the online newspaper for Native America, has been covering the impact of the hurricanes of 2005 on Louisiana indigenous coastal tribes via a year long project, "Katrina, Rita and the Houma". Journalism students Mary Hudetz, a Crow reporter from the University of Montana, and Martina Rose Lee, a Navajo photojournalist from Arizona State University, collaborated with veteran journalists Victor Merina, a former Los Angeles Times investigative reporter, and multimedia journalist Steven A. Chin to produce the special report. See the special report, here.
An anonymous commenter at the Reznet website posts the following:
John Verret, Bayou du Large, LA. (c) Matthew White
Louisiana coastal photographer Matthew White was in Terrebonne Parish last fall documenting endangered landscapes inhabited by the Houma Indians and other native coastal tribes with traditional guide, Captain John Verret. To see Matthew's photographs of Terrebonne Parish go here. (click the X upper right of slides if you prefer to view captioned photos.)
Plant a Tree on Arbor Day and Help Restore Wetland Forests at the Audubon Louisiana Nature Center
Prior to Hurricane Katrina, the Audubon Louisiana Nature Center was named one of the top five urban nature centers in the United States. The Nature Center suffered considerable damage from Hurricane Katrina which devastated its interpretive center, exhibits and the 86 acres of bottomland hardwoods
and bald cypress-tupelo swamp. The swamps were inundated with muddy saltwater for nearly a month and an
estimated 75 percent of the forest was destroyed. The Nature Center has not reopened to the public since August 2005 and the resident and migrant wildlife that flourished in this area have
not returned in large
numbers.
Please volunteer on January 19th to help BRING NATURE BACK.
When: Louisiana Arbor Day - Saturday, January 19th from 1:00pm to 4:00pm
Where: Audubon Louisiana Nature Center, 5600 Read Boulevard, New Orleans East
Who: The Coalition to Restore Coastal Louisiana, Audubon Nature Institute, Entergy Corporation and Restore America's Estuaries invites all interested volunteers to participate in a community based habitat restoration project at the Audubon Louisiana Nature Center in New Orleans East.
What: Volunteers will assist the Coalition and other partners to plant over 1,000 trees in five acres to begin restoration of this devastated forest.
REGISTER NOW Email Natalie Snider at nsnider@crcl.org or call (888) LACOAST Please respond by Friday, January 18, 2008
Cocodrie -Terrebonne Parish, La. © Matthew White
WASHINGTON -- Louisiana's hopes for repairing and restoring its tattered coast took a major step forward Thursday as the Bush administration approved the state's plan to use $255 million in federal money for more than 100 conservation and diversion projects, including major efforts in the New Orleans area. More at the Times- Picayune, here.
Source BTNEP.org
On Wednesday, November 14, 2007 WWL TV, out of New Orleans, aired a segment titled "Solution to Louisiana's coastal erosion half a world away." The piece highlights simple principles that are used both in Louisiana and in the sea off of Dubai in the United Arab Emirates to build new landmasses.
Darin Lee, Louisiana Department of Natural Resources; Patricia Taylor, Environmental Protection Agency; Shea Penland, UNO; Ivor van Heerden, LSU Hurricane Center; and BTNEP Director Kerry St. Pe' discuss effective coastal restoration tools, strategies and techniques that could be used to distribute the sediments that we so sorely need to rebuild our coast immediately. The 7 minute segment by Dennis Woltering of WWL-TV can be seen at: http://www.wwltv.com/local/stories/wwl111407kherosion.3e6b5d8.html
Reported by Associated Press
About 1,300 acres of Cameron Parish marsh damaged by Hurricane Rita is set for restoration under a 1 million dollar federal conservation grant. Continue here.
This article from CBS News addresses Katrina's potential "ecological 'feedback loop,' in which carbon being released from fallen, decaying forests raises the occurrences of storms and, in turn, intensifies the effects of global warming...The good news is that resilient and fast-growing Southern forests, with the help of humans, may be able to temper the phenomenon".
House overwhelmingly overrides President’s veto of WRDA
By an overwhelming vote of 361–54, the U.S. House of Representatives voted to override the President’s veto of the Water Resources and Development Act (WRDA), legislation that authorizes billions of dollars for Louisiana flood control, hurricane protection, coastal restoration, waterway improvements, and ecosystem rehabilitation projects. On the local level, WRDA provides an authorization of $187 million for flood control projects in East Baton Rouge Parish.
U.S. Rep. Richard Baker, R-Baton Rouge, who serves as the ranking Republican member of the Water Resources subcommittee and served as a lead House negotiator on the House-Senate conference committee that authored WRDA, issued the following statement:
“This is a battle I have waged for 7 years, and on behalf of the citizens of Louisiana I am gratified to have finally won. Louisiana has faced incredible challenges since Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, and today we are making the investments in coastal restoration and hurricane protection that our state so urgently needs. I commend my colleagues in the House for overriding this veto and urge the Senate to schedule a veto override vote very quickly.”
On the authorization of $187 million for flood control projects in East Baton Rouge Between raising the authorization level and changing the cost-share formula, we’re talking about a substantial increased federal investment and savings to the parish of $40 million for projects that mean greater safety for people and property.”
The bill also includes language authored by Baker to allow the Corps, for the first time, to participate with other agencies to assess and seek solutions for the “hypoxia” problem or the “dead zone” in the Gulf of Mexico impacting Louisiana fishing, which recent reports indicate is growing worse. The provision would bring the Corps’ unique expertise in wetlands, specifically nutrient filters that mitigate against hypoxia, and waterways that deliver the nutrients, to bear on a unified plan to deal with hypoxia.
Louisiana and Sixth District area projects in the WRDA bill include:
St. Francisville Drainage: Authorizes the Corps to initiate improvements for flood-prone areas of the town.
False River: Expedites Corps work to address the siltation problem harming this vital Pointe Coupee Parish lake.
Intracoastal Waterway Stream Bank Restoration: Directs the Corps to address severe erosion problems Gulf Intracoastal Waterway near the Bayou Sorrel Lock in Louisiana Coastal Area:Authorizes $1.9 billion for Louisiana’s coast, which represents the largest coastal restoration project in American history.
Morganza to Gulf: Authorizes the $886.7 million project for the area between the Atchafalaya and Mssissippi Rivers from the Morganza Floodway in Pointe Coupee Parish to the Gulf Coast and including the watershed area that makes up most of Acadiana. This project authorizes the Corps to conduct extensive flood and hurricane protection; wetlands, natural resource, wildlife habitat, and ecosystem conservation; and will facilitate recreational, commercial, and outdoor activities.
East Baton Rouge: Expands a 1998 authorization for the Corps’ riverfront work in West Baton Rouge Parish now to include East Baton Rouge Parish and West Feliciana Parish.
University/City Park Lakes: Authorizes the Corps to expedite this dredging and ecosystem restoration project.:
East Baton Rouge Parish Flood Control: Authorizes a new, higher level of $187 million for this important flood control project. The bill language also changes the federal cost share from 65/35 to 75/25. The higher authorization, combined with the cost-share change, will provide a $40 million increase in federal investment and savings to the parish.
Bayou Sorrel Lock: Authorizes the Corps to reconstruct the $100 million lock in Iberville Parish, a critical choke point for the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway
Bayou Plaquemine: Saves the city of Plaquemine $400,000 toward a $2 million project that provides environmental enhancement of Bayou Plaquemine by increasing the level of dissolved oxygen and lowering the temperature of bayou waters, which are currently experiencing habitat degradation.
Watershed Management programs: Provides technical, planning, and design assistance to non-federal interests for carrying out watershed management, restoration, and development projects at the Amite River Basin and East Atchafalaya River.
Flood mitigation priority areas: Provides technical, planning, and design assistance to non-federal interests for carrying out flood mitigation, restoration, and development projects in Ascension, EBR, Iberville, Livingston, and Pointe Coupee parishes. The Corps is authorized to conduct projects that reduce flooding while trying to restore rivers to their natural condition.
EBR, Livingston and Ascension parish wastewater: Increases authorized funding level from $20 million to $35 million.
Plaquemine sanitary, sewer and wastewater infrastructure improvements: Authorizes funding level of $7 million.
Hypoxia: Authorizes the Corps to begin working with federal, state, and other agencies to address the hypoxia situation in the Gullf of Mexico.
For more news about Congressman Baker, please visit www.baker.house.gov
This one's a bit interesting. A new island roughly seven miles long has been formed near Dauphin Island in Alabama waters. The isle has "waist-high dunes" and "thick dune" vegetation, along with seagrass beds and " several small salt ponds packed with baitfish". Read about it here.
John Christian, an independent geotechnical
engineer and member of the National Research Council commission
investigating Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath, presents the results
of his geological research on the causes of Katrina's devastating
physical impact on New Orleans and the Gulf Coast. Christian also
provides an overview of the work done by four other independent
commissions, including the Army Corps of Engineers and researchers at
the University of California, with a particular focus on why the levies
of New Orleans failed. Audio and Video here.
TAMPA - Finally, there may be some good news about this hurricane season.A La Nina weather pattern - a cooling of the Pacific Ocean that enhances hurricane development - may not appear this season.Forecasters at the National Climate Prediction Center said Thursday that one won't form by August. After that it's a coin toss, with a 50-50 chance of a La Nina forming. Continue at the Tampa Tribune.
WASHINGTON: Hurricanes and tornadoes have popular rating scales that help people understand their power. Now, weather experts are planning a similar way to measure the El Nino phenomena that affect climate worldwide. Continue at International Herald Tribune.
MIAMI, Jul 12 (IPS/IFEJ) - Despite mounting
data that storms coming out of the Gulf of Mexico could bring
catastrophic flooding to the U.S. Gulf Coast, the U.S. Army Corps of
Engineers (USACE) failed to implement a proposed barrier plan in New
Orleans that would have used floodgates to keep storm surge out of Lake
Pontchartrain and the canals leading into the city. A
self-assessment released Wednesday by the USACE said that a long-term
budget crunch, flawed levee design and shoddy construction materials
all contributed to the disaster.
"There were 53 breaches (of levees) in greater New Orleans due
to Katrina," Sandy Rosenthal, executive director of Levees.org, a
citizens oversight group, told IPS.
"At the base of our discontent is the work of the U.S. Army
Corps of Engineers. There's been plenty of mea culpas from them, but
there's been no change in the day-to-day operations of the Corps here,"
she said. Continue Here.
This one's pretty unique from blogger 'Radiant Rainbough" - :) enjoy...
I am not a republican, I am not in favor of pollution, I am not a
christian, I do not believe in any supernatural phenomenon, I am not on
the payroll of any international corporation, I am not especially fond
of the activities of many large businesses, and I am vehemently opposed
to mixing government and business matters. Continue here.
Nola.com has a really good article on the battle to save Louisiana's barrier islands here - another topic near and dear to the heart because of my love for these unique landscapes.
Reader Melissa Packard just wrote to inquire as to what organizations (besides the Red Cross) are organizing relief for those impacted by the Pakistani storms. I understand that relief is slow in coming, but I am looking into that now. There are reports that Pakistan refused relief from the U.N...?News coming out of this area is a bit disjointed...it's hard to tell what really is happening there. This is the latest news article I can find:
Pakistani police have fired teargas to break up a protest by
angry cyclone survivors as rescuers struggled to reach communities cut
off by floods affecting 900,000 people. Continue here.
Horticulturist Theresa Friday espouses the differences between the Laurel Oak and the majestic Live Oak (my favorite tree) - which look alike at first glance. She says knowing the difference in pruning and planting is important because the Laurel Oak is "very prone to failure in hurricane winds due to the weak wood and their tendency to decay. Laurel oaks may not be appropriate to plant near a home or other structure". For more details see this article.
June 18, 2007 — With an active Atlantic
hurricane season expected for 2007, NOAA’s high-powered satellites
are ready to send forecasters a steady stream of crisp, detailed images, and other important data, of any storm that develops in the Western Hemisphere.
The NOAA Satellite and Information Service operates a fleet of spacecraft that monitor the weather, including conditions that trigger hurricanes and the tornadoes and floods that accompany them. “These satellites often provide us with the first indication that a storm is forming and they play an important role in predicting where a storm will go,” said Mary , assistant administrator for NESDIS.
NOAA’s Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellites (GOES), which operate from a fixed position 22,500 miles above the east and west coasts, take constant images of hurricanes and track their movement. Additionally, NOAA’s Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellites (POES), which operate 530 miles over the Earth, orbiting the entire planet, keep an eye on storms, while providing data — including sea-surface & temperatures, which is incorporated into global weather models.
Satellite data is used in combination with hurricane buoys, hurricane hunter aircraft, air-borne Doppler radar, dropwindsondes, and the experience and skill of NOAA’s forecasters to predict tropical storm impacts.
"Our satellites are in good health and are closely watching the oceans for any hint of tropical storm activity,” Kicza added. “Our top priority is to provide the satellite images and data to NOAA meteorologists,
who make the forecasts that enable emergency managers to help people get out of harm’s way.”
NOAA Satellite Fleet
NOAA currently has four geostationary spacecraft: two are in operation, one is stored
in orbit as a ready backup and one satellite currently used to provide better coverage of South America as part of the World Meteorological Organization’s World Weather Watch Global Observing System. GOES
are the nation’s primary hurricane spotters from space.
NOAA also has five polar-orbiting satellites – two that are operational, including a spacecraft in a joint venture with Europe, with three more serving as backup satellites. POES are key in monitoring changes in the atmosphere and ocean temperatures and climate phenomena, such as El Niño and La Niña.
“We have an elaborate system in place, including back-up satellites and partnerships with other nations, that would handle any hiccups and keep monitoring storms,” said Kathy Kelly, director of the NOAA Satellite Operations and Satellite Data Processing and Distribution.
Additionally, NESDIS processes data from other spacecraft, such as NASA’s research QuikSCAT satellite, which is used in hurricane forecast models. “Our forecasters are using research tools like QuickSCAT to develop enhanced forecast models,” said Mary Glackin, acting director of the NOAA National Weather Service. “NOAA’s satellites are a key component to accurate hurricane forecasts, but our focus on next-generation technologies will ensure continued to improvement in hurricane services.”
Just last week, NOAA officially dedicated a new home for its around-the-clock environmental satellite operations. The NOAA Satellite Operations Facility, in Suitland, Md., supports a range of high-technology equipment, including 16 antennas that control more than $4.7 billion worth of environmental satellites. Each day, NSOF processes more than 16 billion bytes of environmental data from NOAA’s satellites and the Department of Defense’s Meteorological Satellite Program.
NOAA Satellites Show Moxie
During the 2005
Atlantic hurricane season, when a record 28 storms developed, NOAA
satellites sent a total of 11,736 images of these cyclones to forecasters
at the NOAA National Hurricane Center
in Miami, Fla. In the relatively quiet 2006 hurricane season, the number
of images was 7,380.
In New Orleans, ground zero for Hurricane Katrina, the costliest hurricane in U.S. history, GOES sent 716 images of the storm between August 26 and August 30.
“During; Katrina, nothing could have been more helpful to forecasters than [NOAA] GOES imagery,” said Paul Trotter, meteorologist in charge of the NOAA National Weather Service forecast office in Slidell, La. “In areas where observations were limited, satellite imagery of the southwest movement of Katrina, once it began to move through and exit Florida, gave tremendous lead time of the eventual curve toward southeast Louisiana.”
Future
NOAA Satellites
NOAA and NASA are planning the next
generation of satellites that will strengthen the prediction and tracking
of hurricanes. Known as the GOES-R
series, these next generation satellites are expected to bring key improvements
in data for predicting severe weather, including hurricanes. GOES-R
data will result in longer watch and warning lead times and a better
definition of the threat area for hurricanes and other dangerous weather.
Since the first GOES satellite began monitoring the weather in 1975, we have never stopped trying to make this system better,” Kicza said.
Also planned for the future is the National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System, or NPOESS. This satellite system also will bring improved data and imagery for better weather forecasts, severe-weather monitoring and detection of climate change.
Source: NOAA
From the L.A. Times:
A surge in major Atlantic hurricanes over the last decade — often cited
as evidence of increasing global warming — may not be a surge at all
but a return to normal storm patterns, according to a new study.
Using
nearly three centuries of hurricane history recorded in organic storm
debris encased in coral reefs, researchers found that the frequency of
major hurricanes today was about the same as it was during extended
periods from the mid-1700s to the mid-1900s. Full story here.
Dr. Reverend Richard Young told local news station, WKRG that poisonous chemicals dumped in the Escatawpa River have "killed dozens of his neighbors" in a south Mississippi community. " From the time this storm hit up until now, hundreds of people have gotten sick," said Young. "Many have already died, and I've buried a few of them myself." Article, here.
Bill Quigley, a well known human rights lawyer and professor at Loyola University New Orleans just returned from India where he and other community activists toured miles of coastal communities devastated by the Tsunami. They met with Indian community members to discuss common challenges and strategies to rebuild their communities. This appears to be a wonderful initiative sponsored by ActionAid International and the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation. The article focused on these efforts is a good read too. Check it out here.
