Ivor van Heerden cites policy lapses in Abita Springs talk - NOLA.com

Ivor van Heerden cites policy lapses in Abita Springs talk - NOLA.com

by Benjamin Alexander-Bloch, The Times-Picayune
Thursday May 28, 2009, 8:10 AM
Embattled public scientist Ivor van Heerden, who led investigations into Hurricane Katrina levee failures and whose forthcoming termination has been announced by LSU, spoke in Abita Springs on Wednesday night, reiterating his often repeated rallying cry that the Army Corps of Engineers failed in its duty to protect the New Orleans area.

He warned that scientists must be more integrated in public policy if future disasters are to be mitigated.

"What happened in New Orleans wasn't the natural disaster; the natural disaster was the trigger. The real disaster was the man-made structure, " van Heerden said. "If the levees hadn't failed, we wouldn't be talking about Katrina."

Van Heerden also briefly discussed his forthcoming dismissal, which the dean of the LSU's College of Engineering informed
by Benjamin Alexander-Bloch, The Times-Picayune
Thursday May 28, 2009, 8:10 AM
Embattled public scientist Ivor van Heerden, who led investigations into Hurricane Katrina levee failures and whose forthcoming termination has been announced by LSU, spoke in Abita Springs on Wednesday night, reiterating his often repeated rallying cry that the Army Corps of Engineers failed in its duty to protect the New Orleans area.

He warned that scientists must be more integrated in public policy if future disasters are to be mitigated.

"What happened in New Orleans wasn't the natural disaster; the natural disaster was the trigger. The real disaster was the man-made structure, " van Heerden said. "If the levees hadn't failed, we wouldn't be talking about Katrina."

Van Heerden also briefly discussed his forthcoming dismissal, which the dean of the LSU's College of Engineering informed.... (more...)


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Leading the state's independent Team Louisiana investigation into the 2005 storm surge, van Heerden gained national media attention in the months after Katrina because of his largely critical comments about the corps' levee and floodwall construction policies and designs.

His speech Wednesday revisited some of the research by Team Louisiana and additional research he and others, along with several Dutch researchers, had compiled for the MR-GO litigation, in which testimony ended this month.

U.S. District Judge Stanwood Duval is expected to rule this summer on whether he agrees that the corps-designed shipping channel bears some responsibility for the catastrophic flooding during Katrina that inundated St. Bernard Parish, the Lower 9th Ward and parts of eastern New Orleans.

Van Heerden presented his research stating that the MR-GO channel had increased water conveyance into the city, in essence "inviting the enemy right into our home, " and that it created larger waves that destroyed many levee reaches early in the storm.

"Why did St. Bernard Parish flood so badly? Why did it get such high" water levels? van Heerden asked the audience. "We now see that waves chewed up the MR-GO levees."

"If there had been no MR-GO, 80 percent less water would have gotten into Greater New Orleans."