Rills

I think we are all going to qualify as civil engineers before the levees are repaired. Sure wish I was still blissfully ignorant, thinking, what is there to know about a large lump of dirt? I mean, how complicated can it be? There's a nice photo of rills, which are erosion furrows, on the MRGO at the New York Times. The experts all agree this is a bad thing.

That article led me to National Geographic, which is doing a story on New Orleans in August '07 and has a nice web site up in the meantime with some videos and graphics.

My civil engineering education is being enhanced by my finally reading Barry's book on the 1927 flood. It covers a lot more than the flood, it's more like the whole history of modern man's interaction with the river. Why did I wait this long to get to it? I think I just didn't want to read about people drowning, but my curiosity finally got the better of me. Good reading, if you also were putting it off, try it out.