One week after widespread flooding
New Orleans drainage system in shambles with more rain on the way
By
Tom Hall
12 August 2017
A week after low-lying neighborhoods in New Orleans experienced severe flooding following heavy thunderstorms, it is becoming apparent that the city’s drainage system is teetering on the edge of collapse.
Workers and residents have been left to cope with the consequences of what is being called a “mini-Katrina.” Ten inches of rainfall within three hours led to hundreds of homes, businesses and automobiles being flooded out in low-lying neighborhoods. Several schools have been closed. An opioid detox clinic has been forced to shutter indefinitely.
With rain and thunderstorms expected through the rest of the week and a drainage system that is now barely functional, the city is bracing for a potential repeat of last week’s flooding, which itself followed severe flooding in late July. Louisiana’s Democratic governor, John Bel Edwards, has declared a state of emergency for New Orleans lasting through the end of the month and into September.
Saturday’s floods were described as a “100 year event,” that is, a level of rainfall expected to occur on average once every century. However, it follows by less than a year a 1,000 year flooding event in nearby capital of Baton Rouge, where thousands of people were forced to abandon their homes. It also follows floods in late 2015 along the Mississippi River in Missouri which killed 59 people. Such events are expected to become more frequent as a result of man-made climate change.
Because of the city’s unusual “bowl”-like geography, with most of the city lying below sea level, New Orleans relies upon a system of drainage pumps, operated by the city’s Sewerage and Water Board (SWB), to…