The city of New Orleans is located in the Mississippi River Delta on the east and west banks of the Mississippi River and south of Lake Pontchartrain. The city was originally settled on the natural levees or high ground, along the river. In the 1960s, floodwalls and man-made levees were constructed around a much larger geographic footprint that included previous marshland and swamp. Over time, pumping of nearby marshland allowed for development into lower elevation areas.[1]
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The levees of New Orleans were featured in Waters of Death.
In 30 years after people, the levees contributed to the flooding of the New Orleans, where they still stand. The Achilles heel of New Orleans are more than 150 drainage pumps. Without humans to run the pumps and with little natural evaporation, the lower parts of New Orleans is filled with rain. Ironically, the levees that were built to keep water out, hold the floods in creating new kinds of aquariums for city.
A nutria, cause of the collapse of the levees.
The fate of the levees is revealed in 150 years after people when it is being eroded by a relative of the beaver called nutria. a 2 foot long and 20 pound rodent. It can swim and loves to borrow into the levees in search of food and shelter, clawing away at the structures. New Orleans actually sent police SWAT teams after the rodents in the time of humans and in the 1990s, more than 14,000 were shot. After people, the nutrias have torn apart the levees in thousand of places where the barriers fall apart and the waters of the Mississippi tumble in to join with Lake Pontchartrain. With the failure of the levees, it actually reduces the floodwaters which top 20 feet in places. Mike Folse stated that if the levees fail, the water level will be sea level and since the ground is two, three, or four feet below sea level, it would be the depth of the water and fluctuate with the tides. The flood tide being lower has introduce so much saltwater, which hastens the corrosion of the base of the buildings.
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