Regarding There Is No Such Thing As a Natural Disaster: Race, Class &
Hurricane Katrina

It is interesting to see that 100 years ago the residents of Galveston
banded together to prevent a future disaster by raising much of the town 15
or more feet above sea level. They may need some improvements to this to
survive a Katrina type storm, but they gave themselves a future.

My own home town of Texas City is just north of Galveston and awaits such a
disaster.

The residents there, including my parents, have a 17 foot real bonified sea
wall and levee that will act as a shield, but it has 2 major weaknesses

At either end of the levee, the land is only 5 feet above sea level - this
turns a great barrier from a levee into a dam

Also environmental concerns forced a complex design. Instead of the simple
origina design, water flows in, pump it out, the design forced on the city
was a holding tank, the use of the Moses Lake area for storage. This means
that the access to the sea must be closed by an aging gate that may or may
not complete the seal. The timing of the closing also impacts the storage
in the holding tank, As the high tides approach, the storage will be
reduced.

The holding tank also only holds so much water anyway. There are no pumps
to empty the holding tank into the sea, and it fills up in a heavy rain
that are small potatoes to the hurricane soaking rains and the overflow
over and around the levee and through the flood gate. The solutions are
relatively simple. Move the pumps or at least one set (right next to the
sea by the way) to pump outside or build new pumps to pump from the holding
area to the bay. Use the pumps to emply the holding area as much as
possible before a hurricane to provide extra capacity far beyond the usual.
Use the opportunity of dredging the port (now planned) to dispose of the
material (would also work for Katrina plan) and build up the protection
around the city. By limiting overflow, flow around the levee, and pump
capacity, much of the millions already spent would not be in vain. The
original concern that brought the funding was plants involved with the
vital interests of the nation.

Now this may not seem to concern folks much, but about 25% of the refining
capacity of the nation is in Texas and Texas City is up there with the
greatest portions of this. Whereas California and other states have limited
refining and closed capacity in the name of environment, (despite the
highest demands for the fuels), Texas maintains the supply. Frankly not
having the refineries around earthquakes may make sense (neither does
having a mass gathering of people there), but there are hurricanes in the
Gulf Coast, as we have found.

A category 3 or above hurricane direct hit just west of Galveston would
damage or disable most of the refining capacity of Texas for weeks or
months. A severe hit might also take out more. There is also peril in the
repairs as demonstrated by the last explosion in the area.

Finally my father has helped to design protection from the various toxic
chemicals walled off in the area that is inside the levee protected area.
This is an area with a complex mix of toxic chemicals and not all are able
to be controlled in a flood. These includes radioactive phosphorus which
has concentrated in the area from the production of fertilizer for much of
the civilized world for decades. There are also heavy metals in the area.

For the interest of the city, for the interests of a nation short of
refining capacity, for the interests of a nation that does not need another
disaster, there needs to be better planning. Certainly if a family doctor
can figure this out, experts should be able to do so.

Robert C. Bowman, M.D.
[log in to unmask]

-------------------
Problems/Questions? Send it to Listserv owner: [log in to unmask]


To unsubscribe, send the following message in the text section -- NOT the subject header --  to [log in to unmask]

SIGNOFF SDOH

DO NOT SEND IT BY HITTING THE REPLY BUTTON. THIS SENDS THE MESSAGE TO THE ENTIRE LISTSERV AND STILL DOES NOT REMOVE YOU.

To subscribe to the SDOH list, send the following message to [log in to unmask] in the text section, NOT in the subject header.

SUBSCRIBE SDOH yourfirstname yourlastname

To post a message to all 1200+ subscribers, send it to [log in to unmask]
Include in the Subject, its content, and location and date, if relevant.

For a list of SDOH members, send a request to [log in to unmask]

To receive messages only once a day, send the following message to [log in to unmask]
SET SDOH DIGEST

To view the SDOH archives, go to: https://listserv.yorku.ca/archives/sdoh.html