re: S&WB: Several pumps went offline due to electric issues during July 10 storm

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But that doesn't help us solve the problem today, does it?

We aren't going to be able to go back over the last 100 years and recapture the vast majority of that money. So... what do we do going forward?

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I said that not to just pile on and say there isn't anything to be done.

It was more a rebuttal to the "can't afford it" crowd. It can be afforded.

It starts with new leadership at the S&WB. I don't care if you have to bring in new people from Holland or wherever else, but there needs to be someone with experience with the kind of drainage and pump systems but none of the NOLA baggage.

And they have to be allowed to do their job and fire who they want to fire.

From what I've gathered from these threads, the pumps are only one part of the problem. Another part is that in many areas the drains and catch basins are so clogged up with organic material that the water can't even get to the point of being pumped.

This isn't something the citizens can fix themselves. It needs to be done by professionals. And it likely means outsourcing because I doubt the city has enough qualified hands available. But they can't let those contracts just be another way to give city taxpayer money to family members and get shite work out of it.

The systemic corruption problems extend well beyond the S&WB, but nothing will get better until they are addressed.

ETA: But when the city is deciding on which lines to clean first and which catch basins get priority, how about rewarding the citizens that did heed the call to action and attempt to help. Start there, since part of the work is already done. Take advantage of the head start and maybe get more buy in from the citizens if they see their contribution being rewarded.

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This isn't something the citizens can fix themselves. It needs to be done by professionals. And it likely means outsourcing because I doubt the city has enough qualified hands available. But they can't let those contracts just be another way to give city taxpayer money to family members and get shite work out of it.

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That's it, all wrapped in a nice bow. The entire situation is much more complicated than the typical "oh he lied" posts on this thread.

This is a textbook case of a "systemic issue".

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But when the city is deciding on which lines to clean first and which catch basins get priority, how about rewarding the citizens that did heed the call to action and attempt to help. Start there, since part of the work is already done. Take advantage of the head start and maybe get more buy in from the citizens if they see their contribution being rewarded.

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Interesting, but you would think their priority list would be by "number of people impacted" - i.e. first clean the ones that affect the most people. i don't know what their priority is, or if they have one.

Longer term, we need some smart engineering people to design a new type of catch basin that's easier to maintain and prevent crap from going down it, and then replace them all.

The full report

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The S&WB's report to the city and the state on their performance during the July 10th storm and ahead of and during Barry is out. It can be found at the link in the comments. Still not published: the S&WB logs for July 10th.

The report is ... underwhelming. Frankly, their presentation to the Council yesterday had more information. Here's a quick summary of the report:

Events mentioned in the report:

- Pump failures at drainage pumping station (DPS) 1 in Broadmoor, supposedly due to lightning.

Pumps which went offline were Entergy-powered 1200 cfs (each) pumps F and G and S&WB-powered 1000 cfs pump C (while in the process of loading). S&WB claims these outages were due to lightning strikes. Not explained: how lightning could strike the S&WB's equipment hard enough to take power offline but not do so much damage that reusing that equipment was possible just a few minutes later. Specifically, I am referring to the pump C outage.

Pump C would have been hooked up to a S&WB frequency changer and fed power through overhead feeder lines (we assume, there's still no logs puiblished). When Entergy appeared before Council to detail lightning strikes that took out power to the sole Entergy-powered pump at drainage pumping station 7 during the Mother's Day storm, they had graphics showing exact locations of strikes and their intensity, along with pictures of the equipment which got fried. Now, there are problems with Entergy's explanation on that event (the chronology they presented was dependent on assuming S&WB called Entergy immediately after the lightning strike which killed power to the pump, which it appears according to the station 7 logs didn't happen), but at least they had some evidence to back up their contention. As in all things, S&WB just says, "It was lightning" with not even a peep about how they reached that conclusion. It would be nice to know if they have any proof, or if they arrived at the lightning explanation by process of elimination. It matters, because people would like to know what is being done to prevent such failures in the future.

- pump failures at DPS 5 in the Lower Ninth Ward due to unspecified electrical problems.

I'm not going to claim I know everything about everything, but this should not be a surprise or presented as such. Very similar things happened on April 4, April 5, May 12, and May 13 at that station, which I pointed out in earlier posts and which the Times-Picayune pointed out on June 9th and which the S&WB even acknowledged was under investigation. Yet, this time they are presenting it as some kind of new phenomenon.

Perhaps that's because they didn't mention the earlier DPS 5

failures in their earlier storm reports. But they were right there in the pump logs.

- other unspecified failures which they dismiss as inconsequential

They attribute all other pump failures to lightning in the report:

"As is typical during a storm, lightning occasionally struck feeders, knocking the attached pumps offline. Those routine outages were resolved quickly, with no identifiable impact on drainage."

I call BS on this, and frankly, so did the S&WB kind of, as recently as hours prior to the report's transmission.

What I mean is that while lightning is presented as the declarative cause in ALL other pump failures on July 10 in the report, their slide presentation yesterday presented a more nuanced view. The exact presentation verbiage says:

"Several pumps temporarily went out at different station, likely due to lightning strikes. While likely no significant impact on drainage operations, these are under investigation."

The use of "likely" seems weaselly, but was appropriate for the circumstance: a public presentation about events that happened less than a week prior and which have not been fully investigated. Which is why the definitive language presented in the report, which was transmitted just hours after the Public Works Committee presentation, sticks out.

Now to be fair, at the very bottom of the report, there is an elastic clause: "Please note that this is preliminary information. SWBNO’s operations team will conduct a full after-action analysis in the coming days. We will provide updated information as necessary." But we can't really put a lot of stock in that, because they have made similar promises on these reports before and have never actually followed up. On their first report, about the April 4 storm, they wrote in the "Manpower" section:

"We will update this report with specific data as soon as our station operators have an opportunity to provide us with the detailed information."

No such update was ever published. So we should basically take this report as their last word on the topic. If they are not going to release the pump logs, then we have only this report to judge their performance, which of course they judge as super duper.

Getting back to the other, unidentified pump outages (no quantity is mentioned, but based on prior storms, it is probably quite a few), there are a bunch of ways pumps can go offline, from a loss of vacuum, to electrical problems with equipment, to fires (yes, that happens), to choosing to turn them off because something bad is happening (like overflowing an outlet canal - OOPS!). There's no way all the other pump failures are attributable to lightning, especially given most of their feeders are buried underground and they would have had to inspect them to confirm lightning strikes. Plus, if pumps were being taken out by lightning strikes, how seriously damaged is all their electrical equipment now?

Things not mentioned in the report but brought out at the hearing:

- Water main failure at the Carrollton Plant: this may be the one that was a gusher on July 10, and was leaking for at least four days afterward, or it may not be. The chronology presented at the meeting doesn't quite match what was seen in the streets.

- Overtopping of the DPS 2 outlet canal along the Lafitte Greenway and St. Louis Street (only mentioned in response to a question, not volunteered). This happened twice, each time for an hour, prompting local evacuations and apparently with no one at the S&WB knowing about it until four days afterward. When your drainage agency is actively putting water on the streets for two hours during a storm: that needs to go in a report to policymakers. It's too bad if it is embarrassing, but it happened and there's video of it. Own it, S&WB!

- Water system failure at DPS 6, apparently on July 12. This failure took down the entire station, as lack of water means pump bearings can't be cooled and all nine large horizontal pumps at the station would be unable to establish a siphon to start moving water when needed. It's a good news story that they fixed it so quickly, so it's really odd they didn't cram it in the report.

Overall, this report is pretty thin on details, which is surprising, considering it is usually a slide presentation that is a distillation of a more detailed document. In this case, it was the other way around, which is strange but not unexpected for an agency with obvious problems in public communications. I mean, this is an agency which just yesterday presented an animation on how a pump works and got it wrong. They forgot to show the discharge of the pump submerged. If they tried to pump water with the conditions shown in their animation, they would never have moved anything.

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No mention at all about the drainage canals being blocked up because no one has been cleaning them out. The level of built up debris that is in the canal across the street from Costco is insane. There are four foot tall mud mounds and in other canals there are trees growing in the middle of the canal impeeding water flow.

It is insane and I don't see anyone in Government doing a damn thing to change this.

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In one of the most diverse and accepting cities in America, our current Mayor established an LGBT task force at the beginning of her term. Where is the clean all catch basin task force? Put the social issues on the back burner and focus on city services.

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I'm ok with both... but the latter is hard. Politicians aren't fans of hard work.

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The level of built up debris that is in the canal across the street from Costco is insane. There are four foot tall mud mounds and in other canals there are trees growing in the middle of the canal impeeding water flow.

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Actually I see guys in that canal of both sides of Carrollton constantly weed eating, blowing and picking up piles of debris. I actually saw 5 or 6 of them yesterday morning.

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That was not a normal summer rain. Wish people would stop acting like it was.

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Ok. Take that storm out of the equation, and the city still floods with every rain. Anyone who is paying the slightest bit of attention can see that the New Orleans flooding problem is worse now than it was pre-Katrina. Where'd all the money from the federal government go? We'll never know I guess.

I know the system, and would like to rank the problems that currently exist, and must be corrected:

1) Storage capacity - The system is clogged with debris, soil, trash, etc. Just as important as pumps is the ability of the system to store the initial deluge. Personally, I rank this as #1 by a long shot. Someone hinted at this earlier. Good job. The fact that standard operating procedure for Mardi Gras does not include THOROUGHLY cleaning the catch basins AND linear pipe along all parade routes is inexcusable. Problem is exacerbated by the fact that garbage crews blow debris into the catch basins. Some say that if there were NO clogs or debris, that a 10 year rain fall could be contained for 30-45 minutes without the first pump turning on.
2) Clogged linear drainage pipe - I would guess that 25% of the linear drainage pipe within Orleans Parish is completely useless. This is bad because of #1 above, and also for the obvious reasons. There are thousands of breaks and disjointing of this linear drainage pipe as well.
3) Clogged outfall canals - Head pressure developed causes overflows nearest the pump station, in some cases sending storm water back into the drainage basin. In addition, millions of gallons of storm water has nowhere to go. See #1 above. All related.

Know this about the new stations at the lake, which is a good way to think about it: the new stations are tasked with emptying the outfall canals (17th, Orleans and London). They are operated by the FPA (not USACE). You cannot blame them for these issues. They could out-pump the SWBNO stations without issue. In addition, they generate their own power 100% of the time. It is the task of the SWBNO stations to drain the streets. And finally, hydraulically, there is no need for them to ever pump, unless the bypass gates at those stations are closed.

This will take some serious cash to fix. But if we do not get on the money train as part of the infrastructure bill, whenever that comes, shame on us. It is our only hope.

There are good people working at SWBNO. They're operating a system that was built by people who rode horses to work.

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Storage capacity

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Clogged linear drainage pipe

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Clogged outfall canals

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Know this about the new stations at the lake, which is a good way to think about it: the new stations are tasked with emptying the outfall canals (17th, Orleans and London). They are operated by the FPA (not USACE). You cannot blame them for these issues. They could out-pump the SWBNO stations without issue. In addition, they generate their own power 100% of the time. It is the task of the SWBNO stations to drain the streets. And finally, hydraulically, there is no need for them to ever pump, unless the bypass gates at those stations are closed.

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Agree 110% with all of that, and I've even said the same thing....

My question is.....why not keep the outfall canals closed when the Lake is high, especially with the Spillway being open?

If the out fall canals were close they could pump down the outfall canals to prevent the head pressure and allow for more water to exit the city and enter the outfall canals.


Am i missing something or is it really just that simple?