New Orleans Flood in Your City

September 8, 2005 10:52 PM

New Orleans Flood in Your City Map overlays of the New Orleans flood over various US cities.
posted by kirkaracha (41 comments total)

Thanks for the link, kirkaracha. It would have basically wiped out all of downtown Portland, which makes the entire ordeal all the more real/fathomable to me.
posted by nonmerci at 11:00 PM on September 8, 2005

My house would have been under water, in Denver. I'm about 4 miles from downtown Denver, and I'm not at the edge of the flood. That's some extreme flooding.

Although if the flood waters make it to Denver, I doubt the US government, US society, or any of the things I know and love exist any more...
posted by teece at 11:15 PM on September 8, 2005

They forgot Poland New York City.
posted by fandango_matt
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posted by tellurian at 11:22 PM on September 8, 2005

Jeez. Would have taken out most of Seattle, too.
posted by zardoz at 12:03 AM on September 9, 2005

all of san francisco

nice
posted by tsarfan at 12:08 AM on September 9, 2005

What, no international cities? How completely insensitive!
posted by blue_beetle at 12:30 AM on September 9, 2005

Not twin peaks.
posted by dabitch at 12:31 AM on September 9, 2005

This is kinda porn for us non-Americans though.
posted by dydecker at 12:35 AM on September 9, 2005

I'm kind of disappointed.

I was thinking it would be something cool, like by virtually lowering the cities in question until their lowest point is the height of the lowest point in New Orleans and then flooding it with water to see what happens.

This is just a redo of those one of those maps that show the destruction radius from nuclear explosions, adjusted for area.
posted by moonbiter at 12:59 AM on September 9, 2005

They forgot Philly.
posted by furiousxgeorge at 1:30 AM on September 9, 2005

(and Philly has a good amount of Poles!)
posted by furiousxgeorge at 1:31 AM on September 9, 2005

Yeah, it's kind of silly in the case of Seattle. A large chunk of the "flooded area" is already water -- and they didn't allow for the hills. I'm 300 feet above sea level here -- not likely to flood under any but the most apocalyptic circumstances. But SoDo would be gone, since it is just landfill that was part of Elliott Bay 150 years ago. I was expecting a map to show the parts of Seattle that would flood, etc., so I was disappointed.

Still, it gives you an indication of the area involved, and that is pretty breathtaking.
posted by litlnemo at 2:09 AM on September 9, 2005

Holy crap. That's a pretty big chunk out of Los Angeles. Not that it would settle there, huge portions of that area are up hill.

But hey, at least they took out Silverlake. Too bad they missed most of Hollywood.
posted by loquacious at 3:02 AM on September 9, 2005

Anyone know of a site / utility which can do what moonbiter was looking for?
posted by paperpete at 3:19 AM on September 9, 2005

Seattle, Portland, Philly, OK. How the hell is Cincinnatti supposed to suffer a flood like that!?
posted by salmacis at 3:20 AM on September 9, 2005

paperpete: You can get topographic maps from topozone.com and estimate it, or map with percision, depending on how much time you want to spend.

Outside of doing that manually you'll need Geographic Information System software with hydrologic data and some other fancy stuff.

Or if you just want to look at pretty pictures, you could extrude a 3D terrain from a topo and just arbitrarily set your waterline in a 3D illustration/rendering program.
posted by loquacious at 3:42 AM on September 9, 2005

omg the ocean is underwater those bastards
posted by Pretty_Generic at 4:12 AM on September 9, 2005

That would wipe out a pretty good chunk of Chicago. The Loop, Mag Mile, much of Lincoln Park, Hyde Park, quite a bit of the South Side, lots of the museums...
posted by SisterHavana at 6:53 AM on September 9, 2005

I assume that when the ocean floods it becomes bone-dry and to live there we must walk on our hands and wear gloves on our feet.
posted by robocop is bleeding at 6:54 AM on September 9, 2005

I don't understand how they came up with this "estimate," especially considering how hilly a place like Seattle is.
posted by piratebowling at 7:01 AM on September 9, 2005

Yeah, it's rather stupid I guess they want to show 'the amount of distruction' but geographicaly it's retaaded.
posted by delmoi at 7:19 AM on September 9, 2005

"New Orleans Is Sinking" by the Tragically Hip

Bourbon blues on the street loose and complete
Under skies all smoky blue-green
I can Forksake the dixie dead shake
So we dance the sidewalk clean
My memory is muddy what's this river I'm in
New Orleans is sinking and I don't want to swim

Colonel Tom What's wrong? What's Going On
You can't tie yourself up for a deal
He said" Hey North you're south shut you big mouth
You gotta do what you feel is real."
Ain't got no picture postcards ain't go no souvenirs
My baby she don't know me when I'm thinking about thoes years

Pale as a light bulb hanging on a wire
Sucking up to someone just stoke the fire
Picking out the highlights of the scenery
Saw a little cloud looked a little like me

I had My hand in the river
My feet back up on the banks
Looked up to the lord above and said hey man thanks
Some time I fell so good I gotta scream
She says Gordie baby I know exactly what you mean
She said, she said I swear to god she said

My memory is muddy what's this river I'm in
New Orleans is sinking and I don't want to swim
posted by blue_beetle at 7:36 AM on September 9, 2005

Josh at elsewhere.org has put together a map of areas in Seattle that would be liquefied in an earthquake. It's not really what moonbiter was looking for, but interesting nonetheless. I definitely would like to see a tsunami/flood map of Seattle that took account of elevation.
posted by matildaben at 8:21 AM on September 9, 2005

Neat idea, but what everyone said about lacking hills. I live practically at the top of one of the biggest hills in Brooklyn (and Queens), yet it claims I go down.
posted by dame at 8:56 AM on September 9, 2005

It also claims that I'd go down in a flood, yet in Seattle I live 450 feet above sea level!

However, we can still bite it if/when Mt. Rainier erupts. The local news stations say so. And local news never lies.
posted by spinifex23 at 9:50 AM on September 9, 2005

I don't think the idea was to show you what a flood would be like in your cities. There is almost no conceivable scenario in which Denver could flood like NOLA, so it's pretty silly to want detailed data about what would be under water. But even the cities that could get hit by the flood, the kind of estimate to get actual water-depths is the kind of stuff meteorology grad. students or researchers would be doing, not a 10 minute web app.

But I think the intended purpose was merely to show the scope of the destruction, which is very illuminating.
posted by teece at 9:53 AM on September 9, 2005

Quite a few posters in this thread are missing the point of this exercise. It isn't intended to indicate whether you would get wet in a flood in your city. Rather, it is intended to help you visualize the magnitude (as in square miles) of the Katrina disaster, by giving you a frame of reference that might be more familiar to you than the Gulf coast.
posted by found missing at 9:56 AM on September 9, 2005

or, what teece said
posted by found missing at 9:57 AM on September 9, 2005

I call a moratorium on a printing of the Tragically Hip lyrics. Please stop. Thanks.
posted by raysmj at 10:21 AM on September 9, 2005

That would wipe out a pretty good chunk of Chicago. The Loop, Mag Mile, much of Lincoln Park, Hyde Park, quite a bit of the South Side, lots of the museums...

Most tragically, a good portion of Lake Michigan would be underwater.

George Bush does not care about bodies of water. There, I said it.
posted by thirteenkiller at 10:26 AM on September 9, 2005

Why don't they have one for Crawford, Texas? I'd make that my desktop picture.

Still, this is sobering, first city I checked was SF, bye bye SF though, with the hills, it wouldn't be so bad.
posted by fenriq at 10:28 AM on September 9, 2005

My place in LA is about 300 yards inside the circle. Fortunately I'm on the second floor, and I actually own a small inflatable boat!

The underground garage would be completely underwater tho. So long muscle car and motorcycle, sigh.
posted by zoogleplex at 10:28 AM on September 9, 2005

zoogleplex, get your bike upstairs! It wouldn't be easy but man would it be worth it!
posted by fenriq at 11:00 AM on September 9, 2005

I didn't miss the point. I think the point is stupid. There is a difference.
posted by dame at 11:07 AM on September 9, 2005

"yet it claims I go down." Point missed, stupid or not.
posted by found missing at 11:09 AM on September 9, 2005

That is, I was pretending it was about something interesting--what would happen to my city in a flood--as opposed to something obvious--how big is my city compared to New Orleans.

(Dang preview/post button confusion.)
posted by dame at 11:09 AM on September 9, 2005

Okay, sorry I pushed it. But, a new tagline has emerged:
Metafilter: I was pretending it was about something interesting.
posted by found missing at 11:17 AM on September 9, 2005

I'm glad we could work together to make something beautiful, found missing.
posted by dame at 11:22 AM on September 9, 2005

*swoons*
posted by found missing at 11:49 AM on September 9, 2005

fenriq: " zoogleplex, get your bike upstairs! It wouldn't be easy but man would it be worth it!"

Dude, it would be so easy. I can just ride it up the stairs, I used to be a dirt-bike/enduro kid, I've climbed rocky, root-covered near-vertical hillsides! Stairs are so cake with 100 ft-lb of torque... :)
posted by zoogleplex at 3:44 PM on September 9, 2005

Okay, this is frightening...time to invest in a hot air baloon! Not sure if anyone has seen these satellite pics but they are truly amazing.

http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/facility/new-orleans-imagery.htm

The photos show before and after the levees failed in New Orleans.
posted by latinlove at 3:52 PM on September 9, 2005