Alternative theories regarding Hurricane Katrina

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Jump to: navigation, search
Hurricane Katrina

2005 Atlantic hurricane season

Following the destruction wrought by Hurricane Katrina, various conjectures were put forward suggesting that Katrina was not an ordinary natural event, but was instead influenced by human behavior or supernatural forces.

Contents

[edit]

Assertions of the influence of global warming

Some relevant articles are:

  • Hurricane Katrina, for details on Katrina's meterological development.
  • Tropical cyclone, for scientific discussion on the formation of tropical storms in general, including information on potential causes of the recent increase in cyclone intensity, such as global warming.

The large amount of destruction caused by recent Atlantic tropical cyclones such as Hurricane Katrina has caused a substantial increase in the public interest in global warming and concerns that global climatic change may have played a role in these events. Time Magazine, for example, published an article titled "Is Global Warming Fueling Katrina?" - although the article itself addressed hurricanes in general rather than Hurricane Katrina specifically, and was inconclusive.

Former Boston Globe reporter Ross Gelbspan wrote an editorial shortly after the hurricane titled Katrina's Real Name, declaring that this "real name is global warming." Gelbspan went on to assert:

"Although Katrina began as a relatively small hurricane that glanced off south Florida, it was supercharged with extraordinary intensity by the relatively blistering sea surface temperatures in the Gulf of Mexico."

However it is clear that Gelbspan was not singling out Katrina as opposed to other recent storms as being affected by global warming - in his article he goes on to attribute almost every major weather event over the past year to global warming, including a blizzard in Los Angeles, high winds in Scandinavia, wildfires in Spain, and a drought centered in Missouri.

Statements made shortly after the hurricane by Germany's environment minister, Jürgen Trittin, [1] indicate he believes that global warming is responsible for an increase in the frequency of destructive natural events.

Most climatologists today believe that the relationship between climate change and hurricane intensity is unproven, and that the increase in hurricane activity noted over the last 20 years, can be accounted for by factors other than climate change such as the 25-40 year cycle. Recently, Kerry Emanuel published a paper in the journal Nature [2] that found a good correlation between hurricane intensity and sea surface temperatures. Some journalists have claimed Kerry Emanuel's paper concludes that the recent increase in intense Atlantic storms is due to global warming [3] [4], but Kerry states that "it would be absurd to attribute the Katrina disaster to global warming"[5].

Britain's deputy prime minister, John Prescott, has linked Katrina with global warming [6].

[edit]

Assertions of supernatural causation

Various religious leaders have suggested that Hurricane Katrina was sent as a divine retribution for the City of New Orleans, or the Southern United States, or for the United States as a whole. A variety of past actions are blamed, from the legalization of abortion and homosexuality to the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq to the creation of reality television, and future changes in political policy are recommended. It should be noted that most of these do not reflect the mainstream thoughts of thier religions.

"I do not think – and only Allah [really] knows – that this wind, which completely wiped out American cities in these days, is a wind of mercy and blessing. It is almost certain that this is a wind of torment and evil that Allah has sent to this American empire."

"What happens in Israel affects the rest of the world, and how any country treats Israel has a lot to do with how God treats that country. We are praying, deeply concerned and grieved about the onset of Katrina."

"New Orleans, symbol of America, seen for what it is: a putrid, toxic, stinking cesspool of fag fecal matter. [...] Pray for more dead bodies floating on the fag-semen-rancid waters of New Orleans."

"In my belief, God judged New Orleans for the sin of shedding innocent blood through abortion [...] Providence punishes national sins by national calamities, [...] Greater divine judgment is coming upon America unless we repent of the national sin of abortion."

"New Orleans now is abortion free. New Orleans now is Mardi Gras free. New Orleans now is free of Southern Decadence and the sodomites, the witchcraft workers, false religion -- it's free of all of those things now, [...] God simply, I believe, in His mercy purged all of that stuff out of there -- and now we're going to start over again."

"In 1998, Republican icon Pat Robertson warned that hurricanes were likely to hit communities that offended God. Perhaps it was Barbour’s memo that caused Katrina, at the last moment, to spare New Orleans and save its worst flailings for the Mississippi coast."

"He (Bush) perpetrated the expulsion (of Jews from Gaza). Now everyone is mad at him. This is his punishment for what he did to Gush Katif, and everyone else who did as he told them, their time will come, too,"

Similarly, a press release from Repent America's webpage cites such things as Girls Gone Wild, Southern Decadence, the creation of reality television, abortion, and the high murder rate leading up to a statement by Repent America director Michael Marcavage: "Although the loss of lives is deeply saddening, this act of God destroyed a wicked city."[7] The quote, however, does not make it clear whether Marcavage was referring to Hurricane Katrina as divine retribution, or using "act of God" in the colloquial sense of a natural disaster.

These responses immediately placed Hurricane Katrina, and particularly the devastation of New Orleans, in a line of events which have been taken as examples of divine retribution for supposedly immoral acts. Fred Phelps' Westboro Baptist Church has made many claims that natural disasters and terrorist attacks are punishment for human actions that contravene Biblical proscriptions. In the wake of the September 11, 2001 attacks on New York City, televangelists Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson suggested that God may have ceased protecting the United States as a result of secularism, feminism and the sexual revolution.

In fact, Pat Robertson was falsely credited with having asserted that God sent Hurricane Katrina as punishment for the selection of Ellen DeGeneres to host the Emmy Awards. A Dateline Hollywood article satirically purported that Robertson had stated: "By choosing an avowed lesbian for this national event, these Hollywood elites have clearly invited God’s wrath, [...] Is it any surprise that the Almighty chose to strike at Miss Degeneres’ hometown?" [8] Because Robertson had made similar pronouncements in the past, this was believed by many to be a factual report.

Some victims of the disaster also made attributions to supernatural causes, that they were being punished for their sins, or that God was testing them, or even that the event was "the work of Satan." Some evacuees see religious message in Katrina.

[edit]

Criticism of conjectures

Most religious leaders stridently reject such claims. One Christian response to claims that the flooding of New Orleans was divine retribution might be to point out that, according to Genesis, God promised Noah that he would not punish via deluge again. Critics of claims of supernatural causation in the past have, as well as pointing to scientific explanations (such as the fact that New Orleans lies below sea level), accused those making such claims of being religious fundamentalists and trying to exploit tragedies in an attempt to influence political decisions. Many lay persons have severely criticized any forms of conjectures regarding divine retribution, saying that it is absolutely inappropriate to make such claims in a time of national tragedy.

A rebuttal in About.com's "Urban Legends and Folklore" section, titled Hurricane Katrina: God's Punishment for a 'Wicked' City?, points out (among other things) that the French Quarter was one of the least devastated parts of the city.

[edit]

Assertions of the use of weather control technology

Some have asserted that a country or hostile organization used technology to intensify Hurricane Katrina to impact the United States' ability to produce petroleum and natural gas, thereby causing a severe adverse economic impact. Others have claimed that the U.S. government itself used such technology such as HAARP to strengthen and direct Hurricane Katrina, in order to create a disaster that could be used to increase the strength of the federal government, distract Americans from the Iraq war and the Plame affair, and/or raise oil prices, and/or to award lucrative rebuilding contracts to favored corporations.

[edit]

Rumors about the New Orleans levee

Various "conspiracy" centered websites have asserted that the New Orleans levee was intentionally weakened in advance of the storm or breached after it had passed.[9][10] Speculation has arisen — almost entirely from persons referring to second-hand sources or posting under screen names — that the levees were destroyed either by explosives or by ramming of a barge into it, and a range of potential responsible parties have been suggested, including corporate interests, Islamic terrorists, and the U.S. federal government.

One site purporting to transcribe an instant message "chat" (presumably over a cell-phone) from a resident taking refuge in the Superdome claims that the resident wrote: "The 17th street levee was bombed by the Army Corps of Engineers to save the more valuable real estate in the city," further asserting that others had heard the explosions, and that seven explosions had been heard.[11]

Another New Orleans blogger described the spread of such rumors, writing on September 8,

The pharmacy was filled with refugees from New Orleans trying to get lost or low prescriptions of their own filled. This was where I first heard the rumors that the levees were supposedly blown on purpose. One person said it was "an attempt to save the city." Someone else said "Well, if it was, it didn't work."
Neither of them had been witnesses to the event, but as the rumor spreads among evacuees it is repeated as if the evacuees were witnesses to the event.[12]

The Wayne Madsen Report website posted a claim that the 17th Street Levee was broken by a loose barge:

September 7, 2005 -- Locals from Lakeview subdivision of New Orleans report that after Katrina passed a loose barge struck levee causing breach that flooded city. WMR has just been informed by evacuees in Baton Rouge from Lakeview, a well-to-do New Orleans neighborhood, that the flooding of the city was caused by a loose barge striking the levee on the 17th Street Canal thus weakening the retaining wall. The breach was not caused by rising flood waters as reported by FEMA and other agencies. Lakeview is some 1.5 miles down Veterans Boulevard from the 17th St. Canal breach. Distraught evacuees want to know why the Coast Guard or the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers did not secure the barge. The evacuees who witnessed the barge striking the levee also want to know why the major media is not covering this story.[13]

Radio talk show host Hal Turner has placed a story on his web site claiming that explosive residue was found on underwater debris chunks from a failed levee:

One diver, a member of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, saw the burn marks and knew immediately what caused them. When he surfaced and showed the evidence to his superior, the on-site Coordinator for FEMA stepped-in and said "You are not here to conduct an investigation as to why this rupture occurred, but only to determine how best to close it." The FEMA coordinator then threw the evidence back into the water and said "You will tell no one about this."
At that point, the diver went back down to do more inspection of the levee. On the second dive, he secreted a small chunk of the debris inside his wet suit and later arranged for it to be sent to trusted military friends at a The U.S. Army Forensic Laboratory at Fort Gillem, Georgia for testing.
According to well placed sources, a military forensic specialist determined the burn marks on the cement chunks did, in fact, come from high explosives. The source, speaking on condition of anonymity said "We found traces of boron-enhanced fluoronitramino explosives as well as PBXN-111 embedded in the debris. This would indicate at least two separate types of explosive devices."[14]
[edit]

Other possible sources of "explosion" sounds

Others have pointed out that claims regarding the sounds of explosions may be explained by the likelihood that a catastrophic breach would give rise to loud noises, rumblings and booms.

Most of these reports include mention of hearing loud noise like explosions. It is therefore vital to understand that when a structure such as the 17th Street levee and containment wall fail, it can do so rapidly, "explosively" even. A blow –out of the levee canal containment wall could most certainly generate loud noises, rumblings and "booms." Also, rushing floodwaters raging through the breach can pick up and carry large objects and these in turn can become sources of loud, booming noises as they slam into other debris, structures, etc. [15]
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_theories_regarding_Hurricane_Katrina"
Personal tools