In a yearlong review of levee work here, The Associated Press has tracked a pattern of public misperception, political jockeying and legal fighting, along with economic and engineering miscalculations since Katrina, that threaten to make New Orleans the scene of another devastating flood.

And yet, some of the people of N.O. are buying into the official crap that everything is going to be alright.

Tyrone Marshall, a 48-year-old bread vendor, is one person who doesn't believe he's going to flood again.

"They've heightened the levees. They're raised up. It makes me feel safe," he said as he toiled outside his home in hard-hit Gentilly, a formerly flooded property refashioned into a California-style bungalow.

Geneva Stanford, a 76-year-old health care worker, is a believer, too. She lives in a trim and tidy prefabricated house in the Lower 9th Ward, 200 feet from a rebuilt floodwall that Katrina broke.

"This wall here wasn't there when we had the flood," Stanford said, radiant in a bright kanga-style dress. "When I look at it now, I say maybe if we had had it up it there then, maybe we wouldn't have flooded."

And the reality?

When and if the Army Corps of Engineers finishes $14.8 billion in post-Katrina work, the city will have limited protection _ what are defined as 100-year levees.

This does not mean they'd stand up to storms for a century. Under the 100-year standard, in fact, experts say that every house being rebuilt in New Orleans has a 26 percent chance of being flooded again over a 30-year mortgage; and every child born in New Orleans would have nearly a 60 percent chance of seeing a major flood in his or her life.

Translation: The levee system will fail.

Tallboy66

USA

January 2005

AUG 23, 2008 11:46 AM

The destructive power of water is incredible but if she thinks it will hold then it will ,just remember to cry for help when it doesn't.

stockula

Anchorage, AK

May 2003

AUG 23, 2008 12:02 PM

Who would think living in a city that is both below sea level and in a hurricane zone would be risky?

Shalome

MODERATOR

Los Angeles, CA

AUG 23, 2008 12:10 PM

stockula said:
Who would think living in a city that is both below sea level and in a hurricane zone would be risky?

Right, because New Orleans is known for Katrina-level flooding and destruction. Like, it's happened so many times in the city's history that anyone who believes it's unlikely to happen is just an idiot.

Oh, wait...

Chainlink

Christmas Island

August 2005

AUG 23, 2008 01:54 PM

Shalome said:

stockula said:
Who would think living in a city that is both below sea level and in a hurricane zone would be risky?

Um, but yeah, they do have a history. They hadn't even completed the fortifications to protected them from catastrophic flooding that President Johnson ordered in 1965 after hurricane Besty totaled the area in very much the same fashion as Katrina.

Many people in New Orleans, obviously I guess, were survivors of that storm and flood, and the article makes repeated comparisons to the mentality of rationalizations that many are going through now. It's kind of sad really.

But we're only human and realistically there is only so much you can do to protect yourself from Mother Nature at her worst. Very nearly any place you live has some risk associated.
I think it's pretty natural that at some point people just say," I've done my best to be prepared, the rest is up to fate". Frequently, I think that leads into a false sense of security and often some carelessness.

Believing that it's unlikely to ever happen again would be pretty idiotic. Believing that the protection and preparedness, both on a personal level and government level, is going to be adequate to protect you from anything Mother Nature throws at you is probably less idiotic, but not by a whole lot.

bigeasybri

Las Vegas, NV

August 2005

AUG 24, 2008 01:39 AM

stockula said:
Who would think living in a city that is both below sea level and in a hurricane zone would be risky?

Are you familiar with the term megathrust earthquake?