Hurricane Nate Sets Eye on New Orleans

Forcasters show Hurricane Nate’s projected path being one that nails New Orleans as a bulls eye. New Orleans is a city that was not exactly designed with hurricanes in mind.  When hurricanes strike, the death toll rises when the flooding occurs. Two flash floods this past summer in the Louisiana city led to revelations about personnel and equipment problems at the New Orleans Sewerage and Water Board.  The agency’s inability to properly drain the city revealed that another Katrina is not in the city’s best interest, and the city is not prepared for Nate.

According to the Associated Press, “Some pumps weren’t working. Some turbines that provide power to the pumps were down. There weren’t enough people on hand to man the system.”

While city leaders have assured folks they have been making progress, Nate’s appearance is not something they believe they are prepared for.  Extremely heavy rain and storm surge from Nate will flood the city faster than they can free the streets of water.

Forecasters suspect the storm will emerge in the Gulf of Mexico after brushing Nicaragua and parts of Mexico, strengthen to hurricane strength, and on Sunday morning make landfall somewhere along the Louisiana, Mississippi or Alabama coast. 

With New Orleans likely at the center of Nate’s possible destinations, the recent shake up regarding the city’s Sewerage and Water Board which led to the resignation of the agency’s executive director, Cedric Grant, does not exactly have the public high in confidence.  While a new six-member emergency team to run the agency has been appointed, and immediate upgrades and recommended long-term changes are in the works, they won’t be in time for a possible Hurricane Nate.

The team is headed by veteran emergency expert Paul Rainwater (I always laugh at how names always seem to fit. . . Rainwater in this instance, Anthony Wiener in his instance, truth is truly stranger than fiction, sometimes).

“It’s an antiquated system,” Rainwater said Thursday, as he discussed his work and the decisions ahead on what will be needed in terms of equipment and personnel.  The nearly century-old pumps are also costly to man and maintain.

108 of 120 pumps and 26 power generators are in place to back up working turbines.  Also, the city said efforts to clean thousands of street catch basins had been stepped up, with vacuum trucks dispatched to various areas to suck out thick mud and debris.

Nonetheless, Nate is marching forward, and Sunday’s potential landfall may truly test and reveal where New Orleans honestly is when it comes to preparing for such emergencies and flooding.