Re-engineering 350 Miles of Levees in New Orleans
By: Lance Winslow
It is obvious now that the hundred-year Hurricane has finally created the worst-case scenario for New Orleans that re-building the city will require a complete rethinking of the levee system. This means complete re-engineering of the three hundred and fifty-mile levee system. When looking at the elevation cross section of the city it seems silly to even try? Not that we as humans cannot contain Mother Nature or control such forces we as a species have proved we can. Look at the Netherlands for instance; one-third of the country is under water and they live there fine.
We have a number of great and historic engineering marvels in this nation. We have some companies, which can build anything you can dream up. It will take the dreamers, the best engineers and the kind of companies that brought you the Hoover Dam to put Humpty Dumpty back together again. It will take teamwork, hard work and a human spirit of triumph and perseverance. That is after we temporarily fix the levee breach and start the 1.5-month drain of the New Orleans Soup Bowl.
We can do anything, after all we have built the greatest civilization in the history of mankind. It will take the same level of stick-to-it-ness and that press on attitude that has got us here; we must take that level of confidence and determination forward into the future and believe it can be done. The challenge is before us. We have accepted this challenge and now it behooves us all to think “Can Do” and get busy doing it.
Onward and Upward, we are Americans and we are winners. We are not quitters and we will not be beaten, we will not falter and we accept your challenge Mother Nature. This is a nation of dreamers, entrepreneurs, innovators and winners. We challenge you back Mother Nature and raise you two or twenty feet on our new Levee. Category V? Is that all you got? It will not be enough next time, you are going to have to pick a different continent, we will not be beaten here? Nice try, but we are a unique group of people here, we never, ever, ever, ever, ever give up. It is our way, Mother Nature you are just going to deal with that, why don’t you go somewhere else and think about it.
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