Web Dev Ireland

It seems that the death toll from Hurricane Katrina is set to rise and rise, not because the storm is still reeking havoc but simply because of ineptitude and politics. “President” Bush has seen another major disaster hit American soil in his time in the white house, despite the setting up of larger, better funded national disaster contingencies after September 11th.

Ray Nagin is a name that will go down in history not because he was mayor of New Orleans but because of his love and compassion for the people of New Orleans. He has stood up to be counted while others in Washington have tried to put a spin in the slow responses to Katrina. The Mayor made a plea to the federal government on local radio station (WWL) on September 1st asking for help and to be given powers to do something about the disaster, Ray Nagin cried on air (as did the radio show presenters). It is now the 3rd of September and still people are having gun fights, looting, raping, murdering each other. There are still over 2000 people left in the SuperDome yet to be evacuated.

President George W. Bush’s approval rating is it’s lowest ever (this will no doubt spark a flurry of aid to the region and a huge spin on how He helped the people of New Orleans). It makes me sick to think that money that could have been spent upgrading the levvys (apparently they were only rated safe up to category 3 hurricaes) in New Orleans went to funding the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Hopefully (But I doubt it) this will spur Americans into realising what a waste of space George W. is!!

Since the tragic events in New Orleans caused by hurricane Katrina, I thought that this article I read might be of interest to some people. New Scientist magazine has written an article about detecting when a hurricane is about to intensify(they see these things called “Hot towers”) and how they can tell now with more certainty when a hurricane is likely to occur (Water temperature).

This image from the AMSR-E instrument on NASA’s Aqua satellite shows the average sea surface temperatures from August 25 to 27. Areas in yellow, orange or red represents 28°C (82°F) or above – enough to enable a hurricane to strengthen (Image: NASA/SVS)

There is a very interesting movie clip(10Mb/Mpg) which shows the water temperature of the Gulf of Mexico for the entire month leading up to the formation of hurricane Katrina.

On a more somber note about the hurricane, it’s sad that the “richest” country in the world does not even have the ability to help it’s own people in a crisis. People don’t even have water or shelter, Typhoid and Colera outbreaks are expected over the coming weeks if the bodies are not removed from the flood waters. Three week old babies are on the side of the street with their mothers with no food!