September 28, 2008

20 more years of flooded streets?!

Puerto Rico anticipates 20 more years of flooded streets

PONCE, Puerto Rico (AP) — The director of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers says it will take another 20 years before it can control Puerto Rico's infamous flooding problem because no money is available.

Jose Manuel Rosado says more than $1 billion is needed for flood-control projects.

He says he anticipates the U.S. government will pay for at least four projects that will cost up to US$20 million each. He says the majority of San Juan, however, remains vulnerable to flooding.

His comments come as Puerto Rico struggles to repair roads and clean homes after it rained 24 inches (61 centimeters) in one day.

Rosado made the comments Saturday during an interview with Catholic Radio of Ponce.

Seriously, what? "There's a problem but there's nothing we can do about it so let's just not do anything!" Why did they even put up this article? It's not shocking enough to scare anyone (if anyone reading even cares about Puerto Rico anyways) and doesn't propose any solutions, not even suggestions for the people who might be faced with flooding due to the problem. It's useless!

1 comment:

Doug said...

Flood events around the world have increased by a factor of 12 since the 1950's. CLimate change and the increasing world population will lead to greater and gretaer flood damage losses.

Flood insurance payments are unsustainable and cover only around 20% of the actual damages.

Sandbags are the only widely used form of emergency protection. Sqndbags are resource and man poer intensive, provide poor protection, are a starin on local environments for disposal, and are severe health and safety risks long term.

Industry has finally begun to address this expanding problem with systems that provide much higher levels of protection at far lower per use costs. We must immediately move toward these technologically advanced system to meet the ever increasing danger. You can learn more about one such system at www.floodwalls.com.