The national media have focused so heavily on Hurricane Katrina’s impact on New Orleans that the devastation it wrought upon Mississippi’s coast is often forgotten, a scholar said Thursday.
Darrel Schmitz, professor of geology at Mississippi State University, spoke about Katrina’s impact on his home state as part of the Atkinson Geology and Geophysics Distinguished Lecture Series.
On Mississippi’s coast, islands were partially destroyed and coastal landforms were heavily eroded by the storm surge, Schmitz said. He showed images of coastal towns before and after the landfall of Katrina to demonstrate the storm’s devastating impact.
In tourist towns such as Biloxi, several casinos had been built on stilts in order to avoid floodwaters. Unfortunately, they were not elevated high enough to escape Katrina’s storm surge. Several casinos broke lose from their moorings and became floating barges. They caused heavy damage when they were carried inland by the waves and smashed into other buildings, Schmitz said.
In the storm’s aftermath, more than 80 percent of Mississippi was without electricity because downed trees had damaged power lines throughout the state.
In the two months following Katrina, little rain fell in Mississippi. This, along with the heavy amount of debris and fallen trees throughout the state, helped to create a condition of severe wildfire potential. Fortunately, no major blazes occurred before cleanup and rainfall mitigated the risk, Schmitz said.
Schmitz praised Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour’s leadership during the crisis, comparing him favorably with the poor disaster management that took place on the city, state and federal levels in Louisiana.
When asked whether New Orleans should be rebuilt, Schmitz said that placing structures in the devastated low-elevation areas of the city would be an invitation for tragedy to repeat itself upon the arrival of the next powerful storm.
“It will happen again, and it could be worse next time,” he said, noting that Katrina was a Category 4 storm that did not hit the city directly. He said that if a Category 5 storm were to make landfall exactly at New Orleans, a 30-foot-high storm surge could occur, which would wipe out the entire city.
Nevertheless, Schmitz said he favored rebuilding on some of the city’s high ground, noting that the French wisely built their first settlements there and such areas had survived centuries of storms.
Katrina Settles, a graduate student in geology, said she appreciated Schmitz’s bringing light to an under-publicized aspect of the storm.
“We hear so much about New Orleans, but this focused more on Mississippi, which you really don’t hear much about on the news,” she said.
“I really enjoyed the lecture. When you see all those pictures, it really makes it more tangible,” said Matt Affolter, a graduate student in geology.