Abstract

On the morning of August 29, 2005, Hurricane Katrina struck southeast Louisiana and triggered one of the worst disasters ever to befall an American city. The devastation was so extensive, and the residual risk looms so ominous, that, more than a year later, the future of New Orleans remains clouded.

The members of the ASCE Hurricane Katrina External Review Panel have conducted an in-depth review of the comprehensive work of the United States Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) Interagency Performance Evaluation Taskforce (IPET) to better understand this tragedy and prevent similar disasters from recurring.

The report, The New Orleans Hurricane Protection System: What Went Wrong and Why, focuses on the direct physical causes and contributing factors to the hurricane protection system failures. It provides details about New Orleans and the hurricane, the protection system, how the levees failed, the human, financial, and cultural impacts, and direct causes and contributing factors such as overestimation of soil strength, water-filled gaps, inoperable pump systems, and under-appreciated risk to the city. The report includes a number of calls to action relating to lessons learned from the disaster. A fascinating read, The New Orleans Hurricane Protection System: What Went Wrong and Why offers hope for not just the future of New Orleans, but also for all other hurricane and flood-prone areas of the country.

Praise

"...its contents are as admirably clear and straightforward as the title."
John Krist, Ventura County Star