The Texas drought-Pics.
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Thomas Rogers
Well-Known Member
PA floods:
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Those photos give a whole new meaning to the term "Land Yacht: :grin:
Which begs the question...Why has anyone not looked at building canals or pipelines for the areas of the US where flooding is a constant problem to push this water to areas where droughts or water shortages. I know most of the SouthWest and California have some very serious water issues. I think the redistribution of the excess water could help alleviate some of the flooding, and redirect that water to areas that do not have enough?
...Rich
Which begs the question...Why has anyone not looked at building canals or pipelines for the areas of the US where flooding is a constant problem to push this water to areas where droughts or water shortages. I know most of the SouthWest and California have some very serious water issues. I think the redistribution of the excess water could help alleviate some of the flooding, and redirect that water to areas that do not have enough?
...Rich
EddieS'04
In Memoriam 1950-2022
Richard,
Very good point. IMO our represenatives are to busy with pork. So they can get relceted No $$ left for real problems.:sad:
Very good point. IMO our represenatives are to busy with pork. So they can get relceted No $$ left for real problems.:sad:
Kevin Lang
Well-Known Member
Better still, why don't we get the water-bordering states out West (Tay-has, CA, OR, WA) to build nuclear reactors and use the off-peak power for desalinization plants? That solves 2 of the West's biggest issues, without forcing people in other areas of the country to bear a one-sided tax burden to bail out the West. The West isn't alone with water issues.
Besides, it'd be nice to see California actually doing something to help the country for once :grin:
It would take the nuclear reactors to get the power to pump the water from the sporadic Mississippi floods thousands of miles uphill to the arid areas of the country. I also don't think that the perodic floods of the Mississippi would be enough to quench the West's thirst; the West is the area of the country that, through short-sighted planning, has sucked the mighty Colorado river so dry that it no longer makes it to the ocean. Just like the Soviets, we've destroyed our natural resources as a result of poor planning. A Mississippi flood is a drop in the bone-dry bucket.
The tree-huggers would probably protest that flooding is a required part of the ecosystem, just like huge forest fires are, and somehow the tree-huggers have almost insurmountable political clout.
:soap::soap:
Besides, it'd be nice to see California actually doing something to help the country for once :grin:
It would take the nuclear reactors to get the power to pump the water from the sporadic Mississippi floods thousands of miles uphill to the arid areas of the country. I also don't think that the perodic floods of the Mississippi would be enough to quench the West's thirst; the West is the area of the country that, through short-sighted planning, has sucked the mighty Colorado river so dry that it no longer makes it to the ocean. Just like the Soviets, we've destroyed our natural resources as a result of poor planning. A Mississippi flood is a drop in the bone-dry bucket.
The tree-huggers would probably protest that flooding is a required part of the ecosystem, just like huge forest fires are, and somehow the tree-huggers have almost insurmountable political clout.
:soap::soap:
Robert Thomas
Well-Known Member
"Nature is seldom wrong, management of nature always"
KL,
I agree with you about building more nuclear plants and using the excess power to provide other services for the public good such as the desalinization of sea water.
I don't think that man has created the lowering of the Colorado river etc, I think most of the problem has been the many years of drought in the southwest. Of course man uses a lot of that water, but it has only become a problem due to the low rainfall over the past 10 years or so. Then when the rain comes, it's too much at one time and just runs off or causes floods.
Redfish,
I agree in part that some dams and other man-made structures have now worked well with mother natures plans. But many have worked well and prevented flooding in some areas, and continue to provid water to nearby places where mother nature has deprived them of rain.
Pumping the water to locations that need it is much less of a problem. Even if we have to build nuclear power plants to exclusively power the pumps, then let's do it.
The problem is that the politicians in Washington and in most of our states are only looking for temporary solutions that either don't work or are only temporary patches that have quickly out lived their life cycled.
The US built the Hoover Dam that provide a majority of the power for southern Nevada, California, and Arizona, as well as a reservoir and recreational area in Lake Meade. That project was finished 2 years early and under budget. Nobody seems to want to think that big anymore.
Just like the electric power grid, gas pipelines, and even the Internet, we need a water distribution grid that ensures that for the next 100 years or so, nobody will have to worry about the availability of water. Why not turn all the abandoned Strip mines into man-made lakes to serve as reservoirs for storage of excess water from the numerous flood plains in the US??
There is a whole system of pumps to keep New Orleans dry since it is below sea level. Japan built an airport on a man-made island in the ocean. China has built a dam at the Three Rivers Gorges that dwafs the Hoover Dam.
The problems we face in the future are huge problems and they cannot be fixed with small minded thinking and bandaids. JFK thought big and challenged the US to land a man on the moon in less than 10 years...and we did it ! That's the kind of leadership the US needs now and I don't care if they are a Democrat or a Republican.
...Rich
I agree with you about building more nuclear plants and using the excess power to provide other services for the public good such as the desalinization of sea water.
I don't think that man has created the lowering of the Colorado river etc, I think most of the problem has been the many years of drought in the southwest. Of course man uses a lot of that water, but it has only become a problem due to the low rainfall over the past 10 years or so. Then when the rain comes, it's too much at one time and just runs off or causes floods.
Redfish,
I agree in part that some dams and other man-made structures have now worked well with mother natures plans. But many have worked well and prevented flooding in some areas, and continue to provid water to nearby places where mother nature has deprived them of rain.
Pumping the water to locations that need it is much less of a problem. Even if we have to build nuclear power plants to exclusively power the pumps, then let's do it.
The problem is that the politicians in Washington and in most of our states are only looking for temporary solutions that either don't work or are only temporary patches that have quickly out lived their life cycled.
The US built the Hoover Dam that provide a majority of the power for southern Nevada, California, and Arizona, as well as a reservoir and recreational area in Lake Meade. That project was finished 2 years early and under budget. Nobody seems to want to think that big anymore.
Just like the electric power grid, gas pipelines, and even the Internet, we need a water distribution grid that ensures that for the next 100 years or so, nobody will have to worry about the availability of water. Why not turn all the abandoned Strip mines into man-made lakes to serve as reservoirs for storage of excess water from the numerous flood plains in the US??
There is a whole system of pumps to keep New Orleans dry since it is below sea level. Japan built an airport on a man-made island in the ocean. China has built a dam at the Three Rivers Gorges that dwafs the Hoover Dam.
The problems we face in the future are huge problems and they cannot be fixed with small minded thinking and bandaids. JFK thought big and challenged the US to land a man on the moon in less than 10 years...and we did it ! That's the kind of leadership the US needs now and I don't care if they are a Democrat or a Republican.
...Rich
Kevin Lang
Well-Known Member
And today, NASA can't even get itself into space. I still can't get over how sad that is.
Taking it for what its worth, Wikipedia claims that the biggest reason (bigger than drinking water & evaporation) for the drying out of the Colorado is water diverted for irrigation. I'm a bit surprised that the tree-huggers don't seem to complain about how the dried up river has killed the Colorado Delta. I guess they don't care as it is in Mexico (and isn't a rain forest)?
Back to water, I have my doubts that the Midwest would want to part with the Mississippi flood waters if they could be stored as the recent "eco-news" is that the Great Plains states are sucking water out of the water table faster than nature can stuff it back in, which leads to the available space for water actually decreasing as the now water-free void is squished by the weight of the Earth.
Even in the 1800s Americans were creating artificial mountain lakes or working on existing ones and using large-scale engineering projects to get the water to where it needed to go. It seems we could do the same thing now. We've already destroyed a river, it's not like we really care about conservation at this point :cry: Shunt the end of the Mississippi over to Texas or wherever it needs to go. Maybe even have Arizona get its water from Sonora? (That'd be ironic, getting water from Mexico)
So why can't Texas get its Gulf water to the arid areas? If we can't even do that, then the idea of some sort of gargantuan canal system to take water from a place like the flooding Devil's Lake to the American desert seems impossible.
KL,
If you watch the History Channel show "How the States got their Shapes", access to water was one of the key factors.
When the folks living in the Mississippi flood plains have water up to their roof tops, I certainly don't think they are worried about ground water....And I don't propose that we take away all their water. Just take away the excess water that is causing flood damage.
I am certainly not a water engineer nor are you. My point is that we need to do something, and I think building an infastructure to move water from locations that have excess to places that have too little is probably a good preemptive step.
Of course any project of this magnatude is going to be faces with a lot of resistance, but most of that will be political...as usual.
As for NASA, I agree that it is sad that we have abandoned our future in space. But again, it's a political issue and a money issue. It seems that the government prefered to Bailout GM, Chrysler and a handful of Wall Street Financial institutes that the government deemed to be "Too big to fail" than to invest in a proven program that has virtually created the High Tech industry in the US !!
....Rich
If you watch the History Channel show "How the States got their Shapes", access to water was one of the key factors.
When the folks living in the Mississippi flood plains have water up to their roof tops, I certainly don't think they are worried about ground water....And I don't propose that we take away all their water. Just take away the excess water that is causing flood damage.
I am certainly not a water engineer nor are you. My point is that we need to do something, and I think building an infastructure to move water from locations that have excess to places that have too little is probably a good preemptive step.
Of course any project of this magnatude is going to be faces with a lot of resistance, but most of that will be political...as usual.
As for NASA, I agree that it is sad that we have abandoned our future in space. But again, it's a political issue and a money issue. It seems that the government prefered to Bailout GM, Chrysler and a handful of Wall Street Financial institutes that the government deemed to be "Too big to fail" than to invest in a proven program that has virtually created the High Tech industry in the US !!
....Rich
Kevin Lang
Well-Known Member
Only until we got to states west of the Mississippi river. Then the show says that railroad lines shaped the states, which is why they are are rife with box shapes and straight lines for boundaries.
They should be worried about ground water, not worrying about pending problems is what created our current water issues. The groundwater issues are also not along the areas which flood on along the Mississippi river, we're talking western Kansas and such places on the Great Plains.
I still do not believe that the flood waters of the Mississippi would do much good to the West, it's not that much water. There is currently a lake that is flooding in North Dakota (Devil's Lake); can we get the water from there to the deserts of America, and if we can, will it be worth the money? What happens when the flood waters are used up, as that would put us back at Square One? Building canals seems to be a stop-gap measure. Once we suck up the excess flood water, we'll still need more, and where do we get that from? Do we go with the idea of piping water from the Great Lakes out west? That's another stop-gap measure, one that robs peter to pay paul.
The floodwaters are also unpredictable. Like wind power, we don't know when, where, and how much flooding will really occur. Some bets, like the Mississippi, are safer than others for flooding but that doesn't make them guaranteed.
Another thought is that even if we do build these thousands of miles of canals, everyone along the way will want a piece of the pie; by the time the water gets from the Mississippi to Arizona, say, it'll just be a drop as all the other places will have taken their fill. I also don't see how people who are living in areas with water will be convinced that their land and tax dollars have to be used so that people who made the choice to live in a hostile environment can get bailed out.
I've always thought diverting water to areas humans have no business living in, like Las Vegas, is a stupid waste of resources.
Similarly, living in a bowl surrounded by water (New Orleans) is just stupid, too.
Or living on a pile of mud because it has a nice view (California).
It's good natured fun to crack jokes at Oklahomans living in trailers praying they don't get blown to Kansas by a tornado, but it's a terrible disaster if the hills of Hollywood slide.
We only think we can tame nature. It's really just a matter of solving one resource problem in one area and creating a new one in another.
Similarly, living in a bowl surrounded by water (New Orleans) is just stupid, too.
Or living on a pile of mud because it has a nice view (California).
It's good natured fun to crack jokes at Oklahomans living in trailers praying they don't get blown to Kansas by a tornado, but it's a terrible disaster if the hills of Hollywood slide.
We only think we can tame nature. It's really just a matter of solving one resource problem in one area and creating a new one in another.
Robert Thomas
Well-Known Member
The Wise Man Built His House
The wise man built his house upon the rock
And the rain came tumbling down
Oh, the rain came down
And the floods came up
The rain came down
And the floods came up
And the wise man's house stood firm.
The foolish man built his house upon the sand
And the rain came tumbling down
Oh, the rain came down
And the floods came up
And the foolish man's house went "splat!"
The wise man built his house upon the rock
And the rain came tumbling down
Oh, the rain came down
And the floods came up
The rain came down
And the floods came up
And the wise man's house stood firm.
The foolish man built his house upon the sand
And the rain came tumbling down
Oh, the rain came down
And the floods came up
And the foolish man's house went "splat!"
If we ban the building of houses where tornados, hurricanes, floods, earthquakes, and wilf fires occur, that would rule out living in about 85-90 of the country. So where are we supposed to live?? I don't think that there is any place on earth that does not have some natural perils. Every place has it's advantages and disadvantages, and the advantages often out weight the disadvantages. Man has never let nature deter him and never will.
Places like Las Vegas need to plan and control their growth better to live within their limited water supply. California has the same lack of water and earthquakes, mud slides, and wild fires too but is one of our most populated states.
I agree that the government should stop subsidizing insurance companies to offer flood insurance in known flood plains, or hurricane insurance for people who choose to live on the coasts within the reach of the typical storm surge. And perhaps we should ban building anything on an known earthquake fault.
....Rich
Places like Las Vegas need to plan and control their growth better to live within their limited water supply. California has the same lack of water and earthquakes, mud slides, and wild fires too but is one of our most populated states.
I agree that the government should stop subsidizing insurance companies to offer flood insurance in known flood plains, or hurricane insurance for people who choose to live on the coasts within the reach of the typical storm surge. And perhaps we should ban building anything on an known earthquake fault.
....Rich
Living in tornado areas is way different than a bowl, a hill of mud or a desert. You are unlikely to get hit by a tornado. New Orleans was known to be bound for flooding. Living on a hill of mud is going to slide. A desert will always lack water, no matter how much you divert from other areas.
I'm not calling these people dumb, but I won't be joining them.
I also wouldn't say ban building on a known earthquake fault. Don't force insurance companies to cover these people, though. If you want to live on a fault, go ahead. If you want to live in the desert, find your own water. If you want to live on a hill, dig 'til ya find solid rock and build up. If you live in a bowl destined to flood...ok, yeah, you're just dumb; I retract my earlier statement.
I'm not calling these people dumb, but I won't be joining them.
I also wouldn't say ban building on a known earthquake fault. Don't force insurance companies to cover these people, though. If you want to live on a fault, go ahead. If you want to live in the desert, find your own water. If you want to live on a hill, dig 'til ya find solid rock and build up. If you live in a bowl destined to flood...ok, yeah, you're just dumb; I retract my earlier statement.
Robert Thomas
Well-Known Member
Never said anything about banning. If one wants to live on the edge of a volcano, just don't expect me to come to your rescue when the volcano blows. If one chooses to live below sea level, don't expect me to build you a dike. :boohoo:
I have chosen to live close to within 1/4 mile of the ocean or gulf all my life.:grin:I know that one day all the places I have lived (two already have) or the place I now live will wash away. My choice. I take full responsibility for this decision and don't want or expect the individuals living on the rim or in the bowl to pay for my unsound (dumb) choice.
I have chosen to live close to within 1/4 mile of the ocean or gulf all my life.:grin:I know that one day all the places I have lived (two already have) or the place I now live will wash away. My choice. I take full responsibility for this decision and don't want or expect the individuals living on the rim or in the bowl to pay for my unsound (dumb) choice.
Thomas Rogers
Well-Known Member
The only thing is, that for many parts of the northeast hit the last month with massive flooding there is no real history of serious flooding in the past. Very few areas can deal with close to 30" of rain in a few short weeks.
TJR
TJR
Robert Thomas
Well-Known Member
So if my house washes away in a massive flood, in a area with no history of flooding, due to mother nature. Who is responsible for rebuilding or assisting in the rebuilding of my house. Me, the county, the state, or the federal government?
What does the Constitution say about it?
What actually is FEMA's mandate. How did FEMA get authorized to go around in a natural disasters and hand out money?
Inside the Shadow Government
National Emergencies and the Cult of Secrecy
by Harry Helms
What does the Constitution say about it?
What actually is FEMA's mandate. How did FEMA get authorized to go around in a natural disasters and hand out money?
Inside the Shadow Government
National Emergencies and the Cult of Secrecy
by Harry Helms
Yeah :banana::banana::banana:
We finally got some rain this evening. A good steady rain for about 30-45 minutes. That's the first rain we have had here in the Waco, TX area in about 2 months. They are forcasting shower for the next 3-4 days...which is even better news. We are about 12 inches below the normal rainfall for the year. They are predicting that we will not see a lot of rain between now and the end of this year.
...Rich
We finally got some rain this evening. A good steady rain for about 30-45 minutes. That's the first rain we have had here in the Waco, TX area in about 2 months. They are forcasting shower for the next 3-4 days...which is even better news. We are about 12 inches below the normal rainfall for the year. They are predicting that we will not see a lot of rain between now and the end of this year.
...Rich
