European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - June 12, 2007, Darmstadt, Hesse                                June 2007 stars and stripes Page is opinion katrina report design doomed new Orleans by John Krist As the 2007 Atlantic Hurricane sea son gets under a team of Engi neers has released a sobering assessment of the technical failures that were largely responsible for turning the worst storm of 2005 into the worst peace time disaster to strike the United issued june the official Start of Hurri Cane season for the Eastern and Gulf the report from the american society of civil engineers is a readable and definitive analysis of the factors responsible for the near obliteration of new Orleans by Hurri Cane katrina in August although there has been no shortage of theorizing about the causes of the flooding that inundated so much of the the Asce report summarizes the findings of several technical investigations conducted in the Wake of the disaster and provides the clearest summary to Date of what went in a nutshell ignore the allegations that shoddy cronyism and corruption played critical roles in the failure of the flood political constraints but the primary cause of the new Orleans disaster was flawed design of its protective Struc and that makes the report much More than a postmortem of a single discs its conclusions have troubling implications for any Community that relies on Large scale and Complex systems to protect it from earthquakes or other natural the paper is titled the new Orleans Hurricane Protection system what went wrong and and its contents Are Asad Miraboy Clear and straightforward As the the report draws on numerous technical investigations conducted in the Wake of including the report is sued by an inter Agency task Force convened by the army corps of the report dismisses As misperception several common assertions about Kat Rin related flooding in new among them the unsupported claims that the City would have survived had the levees not been and that malfeasance during construction played a role in the sys tems in the levee breaches were significant but much of the City would have been flooded in any the report in Many floodwaters flowed Over the tops of the levees and flood in some this was because engineers used the wrong Elevation data to calculate the Walls resulting in barriers that in some 3 feet lower than de As for theres no evidence of what caused the levees and flood Walls to fail there were about 50 which damaged or destroyed 169 Miles of the 284 Miles of Federal structures protect ing the City was improper design and in the report says engineers relied on flawed calculations of the strength of the underlying soil employed outdated assumptions about the Likely forces produced by a Strong storm failed to take into account the continual sinking of the new Orleans which each year reduces the effective height of the protective structures and made Overly simplistic assumptions about the behaviour of water As it seeps through Sand and some of these errors were others were products of the political sys tem responsible for financing flood control the reports authors episodic and unpredictable appropriations from con Gress Force engineers to develop such sys tems in a piecemeal hampering their Overall and the Lan Guage of the appropriation Bills often pre vents the corps of engineers from design ing levees and flood Walls to provide More than the minimally acceptable level of pro thus discouraging a Builtin safety margin to compensate for possible flaws in design the report available online at offers 10 recommendations for action to reduce the likelihood that a Sim Ilar Constellation of technical miscalculations and flawed policy will doom other american or even assure a re peat disaster in new Many Are familiar to students of emergency planning improve inter Agency make someone or some Agency responsible and find a Way to incorporate new information into the management the report also prudent land use decisions for limiting develop ment in the most flood prone or establishing minimum first floor elevations can put fewer people and less property at that not exactly a novel of All the groups it would have the greatest effect and Likely will prove the most difficult to John Krist is a senior editor and opinion Page columnist for the Ventura county Star in no debating that Mccain Speaks from the heart Michael Goodwin John Mccain is an emotional Man with a volatile temper that some times gets him into but Mccain emotions became a decided political asset last tuesday night and led him to Victory in the Republican presidential Mccain won the night with a show stopping performance that was straight from the give the Man credit he faced two huge he is the most vocal supporter of the unpopular War in Iraq and he is an author of the controversial immigration Bill before yet the Arizona senator managed to tackle both issues with Heartfelt and heartwarming images Are everything on and Mccain response to a question on the War was the defining picture of the unexpectedly rising from a chair to walk toward a woman in the audience who had lost a brother in Mccain approached As if he wanted to hug his voice Chok the heroic Vietnam vet assured her although the War had been badly mis we now have a Fine general and strategy that can succeed he was the Only candidate in either party who could have dealt with the Issue that and it was Brilliant stagecraft As Well As a touching display of it was a very commander chief Mccain did something similar in defend ing the immigration again rising from his he talked of Spanish names on the Vietnam veterans memorial and of immigrants serving and dying in when he was his rivals seemed to realize that their arguments against the Bill had for one night at trumped by an honest Appeal to the Rudy Giuliani also did Well As sex grabbed every Opportunity to push his views that we must stay on offence against islamic Giuliani Fol Lowed Mccain in rising from his chair on the Iraq Issue and he continued his assault on saying they Are in denial on the its what he believes and it reflects the fact that he does Best in head Ohead matchup against All including front runner Hillary the Only pro Choice candidate Giuliani showed that he has gotten his answer Down to a Clear statement of principle that might have some Appeal to conserva or at least offend them my View on abortion is that its but government  be forcing that decision on a he Giuliani was far less persuasive on health he said we needed to change the whole system because its dominated by government and employers and railed against socialized he also compared health care to Home and car the analogy int readily apparent Oil change versus heart at tack and making it seems a risky bet unless you offer a practical he the big loser of the night was Mitt rom who had been running second in new Hampshire and third in most National but he was Flat and out of and was caught of guard by a question from the asked about his opposition to the immigration Bill while he was simultaneously running ads in Romney came off As too Slick by he ducked the question and launched into a series of platitudes about american values and ended by saying we have to sell More things to in still trying to figure that one Michael Goodwin is a new York daily news prickly City by Scott Stantis