Katrina Coverage

The Army Corps of Engineers said the plan for improved levees that is being pushed by President George Bush is a good one for the areas where levees breached but will do nothing to protect the Lower Ninth Ward, New Orleans East or St. Bernard Parish.
…The plan calls for closing off the levees at the […]

Was the floodwall failure at the 17th Street Canal due to bad design by the Army Corps of Engineers, or bad construction by contractors?
They pulled eight sections of the steel sheets that were driven into the ground, and so far that seems to indicate that they were installed to the designated depth: "Engineers Reverse New […]

NBC's Brian Williams conducted a long interview with president Bush, and the section about Katrina has Bush:
- repeating his blame-taking for the weak federal response ("to the extent that the federal government was ineffective, I'm responsible")
- given the opportunity to blame Blanco, Nagin, or others, he said "we're beyond that"
- he was watching the TV […]

NOLA has a round-up of the latest evidence pointing to the flooding being caused not by the hurricane so much as "operator error": incorrect design decisions by the Army Corps of Engineers and others. Commentary here. Keep us informed if we ever learn who's right.

From this:
When the New Orleans Sewerage and Water Board developed a plan in 1981 to improve street drainage by dredging the 17th Street canal to increase capacity for Pump Station No.¤6, residents across the city applauded. Increasingly heavy rains were not only flooding streets, but pushing water into homes. Action was needed. It seemed […]

Monday 8/29, early morning: hurricane strikes
Monday 8/29, later that morning: Fox might have broadcast news of the break(s)
Monday 8/29, early afternoon: breaches reported to NO authorities [1]
Monday 8/29, 6pm : confirmed in a summary distributed by the Louisiana Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness [1]
Monday 8/29, "later in the day" : Blanco finds out […]

"Team Louisiana", the state-sponsored "forensic levee investigation team" with "six LSU professors and three independent engineers" says the floodwall on the 17th street canal was bound to fail due to improper design that didn't take into account weak soils below the levee.
And, they say that bad design should have been obvious to those responsible: the […]

This 8/30 post has several pictures and maps showing the breaks. She also has a category with several other posts. (nofollowpolicy in effect).

From this:
Sheet piling supporting the failed floodwall on the 17th Street Canal extends just 10 feet below sea level, 7 feet shorter than the Corps of Engineers has maintained, a team of investigators said Wednesday [11/9], strengthening earlier findings that faulty design and construction played a role in the canal breaches that flooded much of […]

From this:
When the Texas construction firm AquaTerra Contracting began work on an Army Corps of Engineers hurricane protection project on New Orleans' West Bank, it encountered a serious problem: Its floodwalls wouldn't stand up straight in the mushy soil.
AquaTerra workers tried driving steel sheet piling down to the 55-foot depth the design required for the […]