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Trump authorized emergency aid I believe to help the state with this crisis. I think that was the right thing to do - even if it seems that CA was entirely at fault for what happened there.
My thoughts go out to those who were affected. It seems it could have been worse but that doesn't help those who went through it all.
In my opinion however any such federal aid should go on a tab to be held till CA decides once and for all if they are with us or 'agin' us. Should they decide to leave, if any federal monies are used to repair anything (versus just helping individuals affected) .. they should have to repay it. Can't have it both ways. Right now CA deserves the help as they are a state in the union but the rumblings are getting louder every day it seems that they want to leave. Why should we make it easy for them to do so?
This has little to do with just Oroville damn. We have neglected infrastructure all of the country while wasting trillions in the Middle East.
Oh, I quite agree on that count. But California has been doing a lot of dam and levee improvements during the drought, and a never-used auxiliary spillway didn't get priority. Stuff happens.
As to why anyone would think that bombing bridges in Iraq and then rebuilding them was a better idea than just fixing our own bridges - the mind boggles.
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I don't think the Sierra club was the only critique either.
It was in fact an aggregate of 3 environmentalist groups. And the critique was mainly directed at the auxiliary spillway because using it would cause damage downstream, the scenario where the spillway lip would collapse wasn't part of it.
I would like a reference to a factual report on the situation at the Oroville Dam. I want to know when was the undermining of the Service spillway (the one with the concrete discharge flume) noted and if there was an existing contingency plan for repairs and special operations to minimize damage to the flume. I want to know what the weaknesses in the emergency spillway are and where they are located and what caused the damage. What is the plan for repairing these weaknesses?
This emergency was not cause by any government ineptness. It was cause by the incredible amount of water dumped on the watershed of the dam by a very unusual sequence of heavy rains. IIRC the reservoir was only about 60% full and the level increased about 50 ft. or more as the result of one rain. This is very unusual.
Climate scientists have warned us of the possibility of increasingly violent and unpredictable weather created by increased atmospheric temperature and energy. These rains are a good example. I expect this will be the "New Normal" for a decade or so in the California mountains. This will be great for the irrigation dependent farmers and the water consuming cities but will also keep the Dam operators and the watershed managers very busy.
As far as the money wasted in Iraq is concerned where would you prefer to do business? A public works contract in the USA swarming with inspectors and accountants or as a independent contractor in a place with a grossly inflated budget and no effective oversight whatsoever? Please remember all of the money we spent in Iraq went into some businesses bottom line. Operation Iraqi Freedom may have been the most successful con job ever. More people probably got really rich off Iraq then, if you do not count the native collateral damages, than died of it. MISSION ACCOMPLISHED!
Climate change did not produce California’s winter flooding that abruptly ended a devastating drought. That weather swing is just how California works.
California has endured rotating cycles of wet and dry periods throughout its history. If there are weeks of deluge, a severe drought is on the way. It happens every decade or so.
There is actually much longer cycles, one is like every 200 years and the other 700 or something like that . The 700 one is based on geological records and will be catastrophic flooding of epic proportions as in wiping entire areas out near water like Sacramento. They are way overdue.
Sixty-six inches of rain fell in Los Angeles that year, more than four times the normal annual amount, causing rivers to surge over their banks, spreading muddy water for miles across the arid landscape. Large brown lakes formed on the normally dry plains between Los Angeles and the Pacific Ocean, even covering vast areas of the Mojave Desert. In and around Anaheim, , flooding of the Santa Ana River created an inland sea four feet deep, stretching up to four miles from the river and lasting four weeks.
Climate change did not produce California’s winter flooding that abruptly ended a devastating drought. That weather swing is just how California works.
California has endured rotating cycles of wet and dry periods throughout its history. If there are weeks of deluge, a severe drought is on the way. It happens every decade or so.
When even the alt left LA Times says the crazy weather ain't caused by "climate change", maybe there's hope for Calif in 2017.
1) This isn't a California-specific issue. We have failing infrastructure all over the country, and it is a big problem that we need to address. This is just the latest example of what happens when you neglect infrastructure.
Labeling this as a California, or Democratic politician problem is lazy. And inaccurate. This issue should not be politicized.
2) You're correct that California has had wet and dry periods through its history. Based on historical data from tree rings, we know that there have been far worse droughts (some decades long), and there were wet periods that were far wetter than the wettest winters in California's history (some flooding the central valley completely).
That said, you can never attribute a single storm to climate change. We don't have another Earth to run experiments on...all we can do is say that climate change might make extreme weather more likely based on some probability.
And local weather doesn't equal climate. Nor does it disprove the theory of climate change.
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