US Corps Takes Blame for New Orleans Levee Failure

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has accepted responsibility for the failure of the New Orleans levee system during Hurricane Katrina. In a massive 6,000 page report, the Corps of Engineers, the builders of the levee system, admitted that the levees failed due to faulty construction based on outdated data.

Quoted by CBS News, Corps chief Lt. Gen. Carl Strock stated, "This is the first time that the Corps has had to stand up and say, 'We've had a catastrophic failure.'"

Prepared at a cost of $19.7 million by the Corp's 150-member Interagency Performance Evaluation Task Force (IPET), the report is intended as a guide for future engineers on how to build better levees and floodwalls.

In the report’s introductory letter, IPET director Dr. Ed Link declared the Corp-built Louisiana levee network a “system in name only, compromised by “inconsistency in levels of protection, and the lack of redundancy.” In comparing the strength of Katrina to the adequacy of the levee system, Dr. Link concluded, “The storm exceeded design criteria, but the performance was less than the design intent.”

Critics of the Corps hailed the report as a positive sign of modernization within the agency responsible for planning, designing and building much of the nation's flood control system.

Also See: FEMA 'Retooled' for 2006 Hurricane Season