What do the wetlands do to protect us from coastal storms?
Wetlands are a sort of free hurricane insurance. They slow hurricanes down and absorb storm surge. State and federal officials have estimated that every 2.7 miles of wetland absorb a foot of surge. Governments don’t factor that in when they weigh whether a developer should be allowed to fill marshes and put in buildings. Maybe we should point that out to our local and state governments. What can be done to prevent further havoc from future storms? When it’s time to rebuild, we should ask whether people ought to live in houses that sit on spits of land where the government had no business letting them build in the first place. Maybe we should also ask ourselves if it’s worth it to live on the water when it can be so dangerous. According to Ms. Hauserman. Louisiana (like Florida) has been trashing wetlands in a big way. Before the dredges and cranes built the levees around New Orleans, the Mississippi River would top its banks during floods and wash through bayous and swamps. The river w
