How NASA Defended Its Assembly Facility From Hurricane Katrina

An anonymous reader writes: Tomorrow marks the 10-year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina's arrival in New Orleans. Though that time was filled with tragedy, there were survival stories, and a new article gives an insider's account of how NASA's Michoud Assembly Facility weathered the storm. Michoud was their key fuel tank production location, and if it had been lost, the space program would have gone off the rails. A 17-foot levee and a building with four water pumps capable of moving 62,000 gallons per minute stood between the storm and catastrophe for NASA's launch capabilities. "Water was merely the primary concern of the first 24 hours; Hurricane Katrina left its mark on the facilities even if Michoud was the rare speck of land to escape flooding. Roofs were lost to strong winds, one building even blew out entirely. External Tank 122 took some damage." Members of the "ride out" team spent much of the next month at Michoud, working long days to inspect and repair issues caused by the water. They maintained the facility well enough that it became a base for members of the military doing search and rescue operations. Amazingly, they did it all without any injuries to the team, and NASA didn't miss a single tank shipment.

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Because its not just a NASA facility

[nimbius]

The facility was originally constructed in 1940 at the village of Michoud, Louisiana on behalf of the United States government for the war production during World War II. The site was a production site for the Korean war as well as the bulk of the US space race. the US Army Corps of Engineers knew exactly what they were about when evaluating it from a strategic perspective. This thing was a big chunk of the US space race (a wholly owned subsidiary of the cold war.) during Katrina, so it wasnt your average office park. most importantly, facility ride-out crews pumped more than one billion gallons of water out of the facility because that was what it was designed to withstand. They actually won an Exceptional Bravery medal from NASA for this.

New Orleans on the other hand was crumpled like a beer can under the might of Katrina, and smelted in the incompetent furnace that was the Bush administration. the new levy cost us 14 billion dollars. or coincidentally, almost 1 year of NASA budget.