LEVEES

POOR DESIGN

Although there are several black leaders who want to believe that the Army corps of Engineers blow up the levees, especially those around the 9th ward, inspectors say it was a design flaw from the begining that lead to their failure. It appears that they pilings used to anchor the levee weren't driven deep enough into a solid base. Being below sea level, the area surrounding New Orleans is swampy, boggy peat moss. The pilings need to be driven below the layers of peat and into solid rock and earth, and they weren't. That made the levees weak and its why they failed.