Respond to the following posting:
The 2017 hurricane season started off extremely quiet, until August 25. Several named storms began circling around the Atlantic Ocean and eventually made their way into the Gulf of Mexico.
Emergency Operating Centers from Florida to Texas were on high alert as Hurricane Harvey made its way to the United States Gulf Coast. He decided to make landfall in the areas around Houston.
Hurricane Harvey landed as a category 4 storm with sustained winds of 130 mph, releasing over 50 inches of rainfall, affecting over 13 million people, damaging/destroying over 35,000 homes, over 1
million cars and the lives of 82 people (Huber, Klinger, O’Hara, 2017).
Three days after Hurricane Harvey made landfall, immense flooding was occurring in most areas of Houston. Many residents of the area were concerned of the two reservoirs that are in the northwest
areas of Houston would fail. These two reservoirs, the Barker and Addicks reservoirs were built by the federal government in the 1940’s for the purpose of collecting excess rainwater and sparing
Houston from flooding (Collier, Satija, 2017). However, after the storm had stalled and released so much rainfall, many residents in Houston were afraid of the reservoirs breaking.
August 28, the Army Corps of Engineers, the Harris County Flood Control and the City of Houston made the hard decision to begin releasing water from the reservoir as it was filled. They released
the water, knowing that nearby homes would be affected (Lemault, 2017). In the watershed areas of the Barker and Addicks reservoirs, there are 93 subdivisions. This was not an easy decision for
those in charge. Either they control the flooding, or risk the reservoirs breaching. The released water filled up a nearby bayou, Buffalo Bayou, flooding homes that were not in danger of flooding
from the hurricane.
Due to this matter, many homes and businesses have filed lawsuits against the City of Houston and the Harris County Flood Control. They are seeking compensation for repair costs for their property,
decrease in property value, loss of income both personal and business (PR, 2017). These cases are very similar in nature to those of Hurricane Katrina victims, in that many homes and businesses
that were flooded and/or destroyed were in ruin due to levee failures. This is a similar case in which people were affected due to mitigation efforts that were put to extreme tests by circumstances
that were unavoidable. The release of these waters could end up costing billions of dollars in compensation for flooding victims
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