Hurricane Katrina: 10 Years Later

Hurricane Katrina made landfall ten years ago today. Nobody knew at the time, but she turned out to be the costliest natural disaster in the history of the United States. She caused over $1 billion in damage across the southeastern U.S. Not only that...she was also ranked in the top five for fatalities as 1,836 people lost their lives as she marched through Louisiana, Mississippi, and Tennessee before becoming weak enough to not be considered a tropical system.

Katrina was fascinating for a couple of reasons. First, she developed initially in the middle of the Bahamas as a weak tropical storm with winds of 40mph. She then moved northwest like most systems do in that area, but do to other meteorological factors, she took a dive southwest and made landfall in South Florida near Miami and Ft. Lauderdale as a category one storm.

There was some significant flooding with this portion of Katrina's track, but nobody knew what would eventually come down the road.

The system weakened to a tropical storm again before making its way back out over the warm open waters of the Gulf of Mexico. This is where the second fascinating part of Katrina's story took place. She was essentially stationary for a long duration of time west of Key West, Florida. She was able to remain stationary because of a high pressure system in the upper levels of the atmosphere, as well as no directional winds being present to push her along. For this reason, she was allowed to sit and gain strength at a rapid pace.

During this rapid intensification, Katrina became a monstrous category five storm with winds upwards of 175mph. Hey eyewall was textbook, and the structure was absolutely perfect. This is not what the Gulf Coast wanted to hear as Katrina took a turn to north after her intensification period.

Areas from the Panhandle of Florida to Texas were becoming increasingly worried and concerned about Katrina and her eventual path of destruction. It was essentially inevitable that somewhere from Florida to Texas there would complete and utter devastation--this ended up being true for those in Louisiana and Mississippi especially.

Katrina did weaken slightly to a category three storm before making landfall along the Louisiana-Mississippi border, but that did not mean anything regarding the destruction she would bring. The levees failed in New Orleans, eventually causing roughly 80% of the city to flood. For the first time, a mandatory evacuation was ordered for New Orleans. The Superdome was the place to go if you could not exit the city. And, even that highly sturdy structure suffered considerable damage.

Storm surge of anywhere from ten to twenty-eight feet occurred along the coast, pushing water inland and causing catastrophic flooding well away from the coast. Katrina was so powerful and well-organized that she remained a named tropical system all the way until nearly the Tennessee-Kentucky border. Most tropical systems don't make it that far inland while still maintaining tropical storm characteristics. Katrina was different.

Looking back, we all know how powerful and dangerous Katrina was. We all know what she caused. We all know that it was a storm to never be forgotten.

The next question is: when will it happen again?