Hurricane!

Congrats to Marty Trahan for the winning Katrina Survivor Quilt.

The winning crazy quilt block for the All that Jazz Katrina Survivor Quilt is Marty Trahan! Voting was extremely close at times as I am sure you will agree there were so many good entries. I am still surprised at the high standard and delighted as this means that both quilts will be sought after and raise good dollars hopefully. I would like to thank everyone who participated for without people doing so projects like this would not be able to be realised.

Hurricane Katrina made it clear that water shapes New Orleans more than man.

The future shape of New Orleans will be determined by water, not Washington politicians. Water, moving water, water falling from the sky, water pushed by hurricanes, water diverted, water pooled --- water will decide. Water will write a not so subtle letter to the mayor of New Orleans, the governor of Louisiana and the President and CEO of the US stating its intentions to carve it up as it sees fit. Resistance, though not futile, will be expensive. Their choice.

Scientists have not drawn the conclusion that increased hurricane activity is related to global warming, but it's a tempting conclusion.

According to one government report, by NASA's Goddard Institute, 2005 was the hottest year on record. By the measure of two others, it was the second hottest, and hottest in the northern hemisphere. The others were by NOAA and the United Kingdom's Meteorological Institute.

Click through for a good analysis of the hurricanes and beach damage.

One of the challenges is ecological. Hurricane Dennis subsumed portions of the beach and damaged the dunes separating the housing from the Gulf's waters. As the article rightly asserts, the planning framework employed by developer Robert Davis and Duany--which limited private housing on the oceanfront in favor of a communal beach--proved fortuitous. Since housing doesn't abut the water and natural dune systems were respected, housing took less of a hit than in other parts of the region.

A story of rebuilding after Hurricane Katrina.

A Mediacom employee named Dave had a house about three doors from the beach. All that remains are the pilings on which it stood.

Hard to believe officials can't figure out how to get elections under way.

Hurricane Rita ravaged Southwest LA about a month after Hurricane Katrina ravaged Southeast LA. Secretary of State Al Ater says we cannot have elections in Orleans Parish until possibly at the earliest next fall. He offers a lot of reasons, but none that cannot be remedied with a little effort. Effort is something that is sorely lacking.

FEMA seems unable to cope.

Last year, for example, the Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel found lots of folks in Miami who were more than happy to receive FEMA checks in the aftermath of Hurricane Frances. Only problem is Frances hardly touched the Miami-Dade County area, so damage there was extremely light, consisting mostly of downed telephone poles and the like.

Free market theory relies on having reasonable information to determine fair prices, so price regulation after a disaster may simply acknowledge a situation in which markets aren't working correctly.

There was a case last year where Hurricane Jeanne came through my neck of the woods (as well as other parts of FL). An entrepreneurial individual in Alabama was going to max out his business credit cards to buy generators, rent some moving trucks, and get these generators down to FL where people needed them. However, he was notified that the price he wanted to charge for the generators would be "too high", according to state anti-gouging laws. So, he scrapped the idea.

A political take on Hurricane Katrina recovery.

For example, every day, thousands of Americans are independently lifting themselves out of poverty by landing well-paying jobs and by establishing their own successful small businesses. Numerous children from troubled backgrounds who have been written off are learning skills and adopting codes of conduct that will result in their growing up to be productive, stable, and law-abiding members of society. A great many individuals -- spanning teenagers to “old folks” -- are overcoming addiction to alcohol and illegal drugs and going on to live “clean lives”. And a countless number of people who were profoundly affected by such recent natural disasters as hurricanes Katrina and Wilma are taking significant initiatives to rebuild and put their lives back together, and many have already gotten the job done.

Another political take on Hurricane Katrina.

The hurricane had hit less than 48 hrs before Vitter delivered Rove’s message. Nobody knew yet that Michael Brown was going to screw up as badly as he did. Remember, Brown did an exemplary job handling the devastation from Hurricane Charley in Florida the year before. There was no reason to automatically assume he would prove to be suddenly incompetent only twelve months later. Nor was there ever any discussion during Charlie of taking over the state’s National Guard and imposing martial law in Florida.

As bad as hurricane damage has been, leaving doesn't make much sense.

I have heard it asked, why don’t people move. It’s so easy to look in from the outside and think this. These areas use to flood on very, very rare occasions. It goes back to the disappearing barrier islands and wetlands. It will not be long before the city of Houma will see flooding. Hurricane Rita pushed water surges further into Houma than ever before. My family is Houmas Indians from Grand Cailliou & Dulac. It’s hard to leave when you have such deep roots. To move would mean divding our people more. You have the shrimpers, the shrimp companies, oyster boards, ship builders and basket makers. So much more. The culture is there. Many young people are moving to the city.

Coming after the end of hurricane season, Hurricane Epsilon shows that Mother Nature has a mind of her own.

The end of November was supposed to bring the end of hurricane season to the U.S. Gulf Coast region. But as this record-breaking season has shown, if Mother Nature pays little heed to man-made inventions such as buildings, oil rigs and refineries, what respect will she have for a calendar? History suggests that after suffering through Katrina and her evil twin, Rita, the key oil producing and refining region is in for a respite as rebuilding continues. In the past century, only 1 major hurricane has made landfall in Texas or Louisiana after September, according to the U.S. National Weather Service.

This hurricane season gives everyone something to be thankful for.

I am thankful that my grandmother and grandfather got out of hurricane Rita’s way. That is because Beaumont, where they lived. was the hardest hit area. No significant damage was done to their house, but the area around it is a mess. That is what I am thankful for.

Better surge models would help with evacuation planning.

One of the lessons I learned from this cat season — Katrina in particular — is just how much uncertainty exists in cat model outputs, particularly when looking at single- or multi-location accounts, and most especially when considering potential damageability from storm surge.

Lots of good statistics on the 2005 hurricane season on this post:

The 2005 hurricane season was a terror for those living along the Gulf of Mexico and Atlantic coasts. Here’s a tally of what happened.

Great first-hand story of helping out after Hurricane Rita.

Just wanted to give you another update of our trip to Texas. Bob and I returned home late Saturday night. We had been in New Orleans and San Antonio for a few days when Mike Lynch - Minneapolis BNF - called us to say that the Beaumont, TX area had been hit hard from hurricane Rita. He asked us to come. We arrived in the Beaumont area on Tues. morning. We arrived in Nederland just south of Beaumont. The hurricane hit on Sat. and Mike was on site at 9 am Sunday. He set up a distribution center at Triumph church in Nederland.