Hurricane Katrin Hurricane Devastation - 1291 Words

Hurricane Katrina was a storm that should not have caused as much damage as it did. Hurricane Katrina was category one when it made landfall in the state of Florida and was only a category three storm when it made landfall at the Louisiana-Mississippi border (Zimmerman). The weak infrastructure and physical characteristics of cities like New Orleans experience a much greater impact than would normally be expected with a category three hurricane. 1,833 people were killed, the majority of whom were in Louisiana (CNN Library). The total damage to property, buildings, infrastructure, etc. was $108 billion, the most damage ever incurred by a hurricane in the United States (CNN Library). Seventy percent of all occupied housing in New Orleans were destroyed and hundreds of thousands were displaced from the city (CNN Library). Overall, Hurricane Katrina was one of the most devastating hurricanes in U.S. history and could have been avoided had actions been taken earlier and had infrastructure been better. The tropical depression that would become Hurricane Katrina began â€Å"322 km southeast of the Bahamas on Aug. 23, 2005† (Zimmerman). By August 24th, the depression had become a tropical storm (Zimmerman). On August 25th, Tropical Storm Katrina became a category one hurricane and made landfall in Southern Florida, leading to flooding and the death of two people (Zimmerman). Hurricane Katrina then downgraded to a tropical storm until it was â€Å"stalled beneath a very large