njlauren
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Joined: 10/1/2011
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quote:
ORIGINAL: BamaD
quote:
ORIGINAL: njlauren
quote:
ORIGINAL: BamaD
"For example, Alabama points out that when the big floods hit the midwest, that people in
California chided people for living in a flood plane, and it is the pot calling the kettle black.
What he left out is that the federal government, thanks to pressure from both congressmen
in that area and the river shipping industry, had the army corps of engineers reroute the
mississippi, both to make it more navigable, and also ironically to reduce flooding in certain
areas to make them more attractive to build houses..and what happened was they created
an even bigger mess (by moving the river, they took away the natural means of the river to
handle high water, and all the levees in the world won't stop it). Since then they have bought
out people in the area they stupidly allowed to live there, and have let the river go back to
more its natural banks. "
Funny, my family (they live within sight of the Mississippi in Missouri) said that they rebuilt
and reinforced the levees. There are whole towns that would have to be abandoned.
When the levees opposite my home town broke it flooded towns as much as 10 miles
from the river and inundated some that were closer to the river.
One levee, north of Hannibal was the victim of sabotage (not my opinion there was a
conviction in the case. The one across the river was in poor repair.
You are clearly unfamiliar with the Mississippi. The only thing to change it's course
was the New Madrid earthquakes of 1820 (directly responsible for the founding of
my home town). They didn't change it's course they contained it till a 1000 year flood hit.
They did in some places, in others they bought out land and let the Mississippi go back to its natural channels. There was an entire episode on NOVA on PBS about the big floods and how the Mississippi's path had been diverted and what it caused .The fact that one town was rebuilt doesn't mean they all were, and the point is that even if we let the Mississippi alone, it would flood. The fact that they need levees in the first place says they are building in areas prone to flood.
It also proves my point, because guess who likely builds and maintains those levees? Federal money and probably Army Corps of Engineers, which reinforces my point, that we pay to have people live in areas prone to flooding, and pay to rebuild them, too. The levees themselves are problematic, they are built high and tend to narrow the river's width, which in turn causes the water to be in a smaller area and has nowhere to go.
This is from one website:
Human Causes of the 1993 Floods
Urbanisation of the Flood Plain - reducing infiltration rates etc
Poorly built non-federal levees
The development of unsuitable sites for development
The channelisation of the river - especially at St Louis
The last is one of the biggies.
One note, that 1993 was called 'a once in 500 year flood'..yet in 2008, 15 years later, a second 500 year event happened, which should tell us a lot, that something is causing these events to happen more, and human activitity is probably part of it.
Yep people cause the floods so they should get rid of the levees and move out of the flood planes.
they should move away from the coasts and avoid hurricanes because people cause them too.
We need to abandon California due to the earthquakes after all they too must be the fault of humanity.
People shouldn't be allowed to live in mountainous areas, avalanches you know. The great planes
are out, tornadoes, also our fault. It's just stupid to let people live anywhere.
They can live where they want, but they shouldn't expect to have their stupidity subsidized. If people live in an earthquake zone in housing that can't take it, when people live in hurricane zones with buildings, like happened in Andrew, that were poorly made and don't meet standards, they shouldn't be subsidized into rebuilding time and again.A once in 100 year event is a tragedy, and is an unexpected consequence. Dense population growth in low lying sea coast areas and barrier Islands, that get hit and rebuilt time and again, is stupid. The Mississippi has had several major floods in the last 20 years, many hitting places that have gotten hit time and again. Sometimes natural disasters are human fault (like building houses in areas where you know there are avalanches, active volcanoes, or where because of man made activity things like sand dunes and such that would protect the coast were stripped away so rich people in seaside homes and condos could have an unobstructed view of the ocean, others are random natural disasters.
What is at fault is people building on vulnerable sea coasts and barrier islands when it is well know that they are vulnerable in storms, the amount of population density on barrier islands and low lying coast has grown exponentially over the last 50 years,for example. What is at fault is building in areas of high risk, and expecting to be bailed out time and again, and also expecting others to pay for that, in the form, for example, of high flood insurance properties in non flood areas to pay for people living in low lying flood plains and the such, or on the sea coast, where a lot of what has been built is very, very expensive housing. If people want to be stupid and build in places that have flooded or gotten hit by storms time and again, that is their right, what is the problem is then they expect to get bailed out and have everyone else pay for it. I have compassion for people who get hit with random tragedies, once in a 100 year floods, freak storms like "The Perfect Storm", rare earthquakes in zones not expected, but flaunting the dangers time and again and then expecting others to make up for those mistakes is quite frankly not freedom, it is arrogantly assuming others should pick up the burdens of stupidity.
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RE: Tragedy foretold but ignored - 
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