Katrina victims use science to sue US government

10:34 07 May 2009 by Celeste Biever


FLOODS in New Orleans following hurricane Katrina were made worse by a channel dug by a US government agency, according to testimony heard by a federal court. The hearing, in which the government is being sued for allowing the channel to be built, could lead to payouts to hundreds of thousands of flood victims. It may also lead to massive reforms in flood protection.

The evidence comes from the most detailed modelling of Katrina's storm surge to date. "Science is the most critical factor in this courtroom," says Pierce O'Donnell, lead attorney for the plaintiffs. "To win the day, one side has to provide the judge with a more compelling scientific case than the other."

The court case is being brought by two residents of the Lower Ninth Ward, a resident and a business in St Bernard's Parish and one resident of New Orleans East.

The US government cannot be sued for the failure of flood protection measures. This court case (pdf format), got the go-ahead (pdf format) because it concerns a channel, called the Mississippi River Gulf Outlet (MRGO, or "Mister Go") dug by the US Army Corps of Engineers(USACE). The channel was built in the 1960s to bring shipping into the city.

more: http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn17087-katrina-victims-use-science-to-sue-us-government.html

hope it catches on and we see some other suits come of this.

BTW...remarkable fairly new book that I loved is
The Great Deluge: Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans, and the Mississippi Gulf Coast
by Douglas Brinkley..
It details the Corp of Engineers, how they got their start, how what they did led to the Mississippi flood of 1927, and later to the problems from Katrina.
Very readable, full of details, and helped me understand the issues with the site of New Orleans and the flodds/hurricanes.

...many people in New Orleans claimed that it would let hurricanes come straight into the city.
I lived in New Orleans (1950 - 1999), and remember this well.

There was a lot of opposition to the GO Canal.