Hurricane Katrina Victims Have Standing To Sue Over Global Warming

Bring it on!
How was any hypothetical “global warming” responsible for shoddy construction of the dykes around the city of New Orleans?
The State of Mississippi was where hurricane Katrina actually made it’s landfall. New Orleans was a victim of political graft and corruptions, and eventually it caught up with them.

This month Japan was hit by a typhoon without tremendous damage. The last hit was in September 2007. No noticeable change these years.

tokyoboy, I lived through Typhoon Melor and it came at Japan as a category 5. Only the wind sheer (and perhaps slightly cooler anomaly ocean temp on the Pacific side) cut it down to a 3 before landfall. I have been reading over and over again for both Pacific and the Atlantic Oceans about the wind sheer decapitating hurricanes/typhoons. Are the oceans warm enough for significant destructiveness but other processes are at work? Anyone want to comment on this phenomenon?

My understanding, the formula to estimate hurricane surface winds from the package dropped by hurricane hunters has been changed a number of times.
Does anyone know if these formula changes have been accounted for?
Thanks.
BTW I live near Bay St Louis. The only one I want to sue works for NASA.

ah, a Bay Rat! I lived in Pass Christian.
[REPLY – Ever read Heinlein’s The Puppet Masters? ~ Evan]

Justice in the legal system happens by a carefully contrived but not infallible accident. Especially when uninformed juries and complex data are involved.

Send algore a summons Take his phoney claims into interrogatories and discovery.
In these liability claims, it takes a lot of testimony. Newspaper clippings are hearsay.
Since we have always had storms, how do we isolate this one? That is a town built below sealevel? And why this storm and not Rita?

Steve Huntwork (18:58:51) :
“…..The State of Mississippi was where hurricane Katrina actually made it’s landfall. New Orleans was a victim of political graft and corruptions, and eventually it caught up with them……….”
Steve, please see Katrina’s actual Louisiana landfall at the National Hurricane center link:
http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/archive/2005/KATRINA_graphics.shtml
Not that it will matter much, but I did notice a few hundred Louisiana houses blown down or damaged, not caused by corruption. Thousands of trees were broken in two or blown down, not caused by corruption. A significant part of Slidell, Louisiana (NE of New Orleans), was flooded, not caused by corruption.
The greatest damage in New Orleans was due to the collapse of floodwalls built by the Corp of Engineers. Maybe corruption did cause the design flaws in the floodwalls, but I doubt it. See the following report from Delft University in The Netherlands:
http://www.tudelft.nl/live/pagina.jsp?id=62d6f4f8-0e4a-4e52-9cf7-044ee0185816&lang=en
My point: Inaccuracy in news reporting (regarding landfall) and lack of precision with insults (regarding corruption causing the main damage in New Orleans), will reduce our credibility when we insult our common enemy, the AGWers.

While Maue’s Accumulated Cyclone Energy bares no resemblance to atmospheric CO2, it does look a fair bit like the global temperature anomaly shown next to it on your new world climate widget. Is there a recognized weather predictive relationship?

The final stages of degeneracy are when the leadership actively seeks the destructoin of the society.
We are there now.

So, first they’ll have to prove Global Warming.
Then CO2 is the cause.
Then the CO2 is from industry and not natural.
Then GW causes increased hurricanes.
And then…. natural GW does not exist.
We’re going to need Big bucket of popcorn for this movie.

It should be a UFC Championship fight between the IPCC and the Farmers Almnac.

I can’t see the oil and gas companies having any option but to defend themselves from this. Otherwise, it will just open the floodgates to all sorts of nuisance claims, even if they were to settle out of court with no fault attached.
In order so that justice can be done, absolutely all the evidence will have to be submitted. This could be the Scopes trial we were talking about in previous threads. Exciting times.

I had already read the article. The article, of course, also says that the plaintiff’s lawyers will still have a problem with causation, with one of the judges on the panel stating that if the causation issue had been part of the appeal, he would have affirmed the dismissal order of the district court.
Being a lawyer, I unfortunately know that this does not stop some lawyers from making absurd arguments with a straight face. It is not a good thing that my profession is trying to do.

rbateman (20:31:49) :
We already know the prosecution has ‘contaminated’ the evidence.
But “hot air” decreases the differential.
Less energy transfer.

whats happened to DMI? seems to be permanently closed (3 weeks now?)

Unfortunately there is a real danger here and it is not just the danger of the courts awarding cash from “rich” energy companies to destitute hurricane victims.
Remember the Kingsnorth Power Station case in the UK where the eco-fascist morons who vandalised the station were found not guilty by a jury obviously persuaded by Jim Hansen and his gang of clowns.
The interesting thing in that case, which hasn’t been much commented upon:- what kind of prosecution case was put forward? Did they put Lord Monckton (say) up as an expert witness to rubbish Hansen’s testimony? No chance!
What kind of outcome from the Kingsnorth case was Gordon Brown, Ed Miliband and the rest hoping for? The one they got, of course!
And what outcome will Obama hope for in this New Orleans case? No prizes for guessing! Will genuine science, logic and common sense even get an airing in court?
I just hope the US justice system is a bit more robust.

James H (19:59:20) :
This is pretty high-stakes, though. If the plaintiffs prevail, it would open the floodgates to sue anyone that emits CO2. I think that people even exhale CO2, so I guess we’re all responsible. Also, remember in a civil case, the burden is not beyond a reasonable doubt but rather the preponderance of evidence.
If that happens James, we return America to the Indians and move on.

@a jones A lot of the local law is built around the code of Napoleon, given that the French owned the area prior to the Louisiana Purchase. However, this suit is proceeding across state lines and therefore falls under the Federal jurisdiction.

While I saw the destruction of this storm first hand in the 9th ward and it was truly horrible, it was a disaster that was waiting to happen.

Absolutely correct, I worked in emergency management for from the late 1970’s to early 1990’s and it was common knowledge (ie used as an obvious problem example) that if New Orleans was hit with a major hurricane there would be major destruction, and very high likelihood that they would have significant flooding due to over topping of levees, failure of levees, or lack of pumping capacity or pump failures making it impossible to keep the basin the city is built in pumped out.
Most of the city is below local sea level, the only reason the city is dry is due to large pumping systems.
It was one of those situations that everyone that had a clue knew was going to happen for about 40 years (at least ever since Hurricane Camille in 1969).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hurricane_Camille
Larry

@Bill Illis…
Bill, maybe you can offer up your paleo sea level reconstructions to the defense team. Most people in the courtroom would probably be shocked to see how much sea level had already risen before man ever burned his first lump of coal or Col. Drake drilled his well in Titusville PA.
On another note…
Wouldn’t the plaintiffs also have to go after the people who actually burned the coal and oil? It seems to me that the courts have fairly well established that firearms manufacturers are not liable for gun violence. Assuming that the plaintiffs use electricity, heat their homes and drive automobiles… They might just have to… Go sue themselves!

Why can’t the prosecution just take the chart and turn it upside down and offer it as PROOF for their case?

Cedarhill, you make very good points – but I think you left out the most important one. The plaintiffs will need to show that the defendant’s actions were proximately linked to the harm caused. If the linkage between the defendants actions and the harm caused is too attenuated, then the defendants cannot be held liable.
This decision in favor of standing did *Not* (as I’m sure you know) establish that linkage – it simply allowed the plaintiffs the opportunity to establish that linkage in court. If they cannot, then this case is still subject to being tossed with a summary judgment. Standing is just the first of several hurdles that get progressively higher. I think this linkage will be extremely difficult to show for several reasons – if I understand correctly, they are suing oil and gas producers, not actual CO2 emitters. This means that not only are they trying to prove a linkage to “global warming”, but they have also got to prove that the defendants are responsible for their customer’s use of their products, even though they had no control over that use. For example, how could the producers control whether or not their customers used adequate emissions controls?
This argument has failed in almost every industry in which it has been tried (ie: gun manufacturers) and it is just one of many reasons why it is very unlikely that this ever makes it before a jury.

I think they have a better case against the Smithsonian and the estate of Lorenz:
http://www.gardens.si.edu/horticulture/gardens/nmnh/butterfly.html

Crow:
Thanks for the link. I read it. Doesn’t prove a thing. The author ADMITTED that this area is “warming faster than most other parts of the world”. So, what you have here is ANECDOTAL evidence of warming. Not GLOBAL evidence of warming.
Funny, any time a skeptic points out cooling in a specific location, or at a specific time, the alarmists scream about it being “anecdotal evidence”. But they don’t have a problem using the same kind of anecdotal evidence when it supports their own whacky conclusions.
And where did the author come up with this “natural cooling trend which began 8,000 years ago”? I’ve never heard of this before. I thought we were in the middle of an Interglacial which began around 10-12,000 years ago, at the end of the last Glacial Maximum. If this is based on a 21,000-year cycle, we should have experienced gradual WARMING over the last 10,000 years, not cooling. This is the first article I’ve seen claiming any kind of cooling trend over the last 8,000 years. (Mann claimed a 1,000-year cooling trend, but that has been thoroughly discredited, as have, now, the subsequent papers by Mann’s buddies claiming to confirm it.)

The Mississippi gulf coast was hit by a similar surge ~100 years ago.
This is total bunk, and the 5th Circuit is completely out of line on this.
It is not clear from the article, but was this the complete panel of the 5th, or a smaller subset.
If it is not the complete Circuit, there is some hope it can still be treated as it should be: tossed out.
The flip side is that this may become the much sought after trial about AGW that is long over due.
I do have a practical idea:
The energy companies should provide immediate voluntary relief to all plaintiffs, attorneys and judges in the case:
Power companies should halt all electricity sales to anyone on the plaintiff side, oil and gas companies should cut off sales of all products to them as well, and any stores that receive products in a manner that involves the release of CO2 should stop all sales to the plaintiffs, their lawyers, and the Judges who have contrived this ridiculous false claim.
That way the defendants can mitigate their damages to these special people.
And the plaintiffs and their pals can start experiencing the fruits of the desires immediately.

I think it is unwise to assume that this will be the “trial of AGW” that many of us hope for.
Depending on what the defendants think is in their best interests – or their least-worse option. they may not even try to argue that CO2 doesn’t cause global warming.
For example, they might settle, thinking that, after all the propaganda, that they will struggle to convince a jury that AGW is nonsense.
Some industries might even accept their “guilt” because the payout could be cheaper than losing their place on the AGW gravy-train.
When you have such insanity as the UK government giving grants to environmental groups specifically so that they can lobby the UK government (so that government ministers can then claim that they are responding to “public pressure”) then Alice in Wonderland and Catch 22 are the most useful handbooks.

How ridiculous. Was Betsy in 1965 caused by global warming? What about Camille in 1969? How far back to we go?
Their specific argument is even more bogus. So global warming caused the sea level rise which made the hurricane more damaging? Even if I assume that’s true, from what little I can find, the Mississippi Gulf Coast’s sea level has been rising around 2mm/yr. I’d love to know the exact amount. If I go back 36 years before Katrina (since Camille destroyed the area) that would mean 72 mm or 0.23 ft. That’s less that a fifth of the change that the daily tide causes. The storm surge of Katrina was up to 27 ft along the coast. It’s hard to believe that extra 0.8% of sea level could be shown to have contributed to Katrina’s damage in any significant way.

DanbO: “My understanding, the formula to estimate hurricane surface winds from the package dropped by hurricane hunters has been changed a number of times.”
Winds are measured these days by dropsondes using GPS. I do not know how winds from multiple sondes are handled, but I think all are reported and I would assume that the highest reading is selected as the maximum and reported as such.

I have my own opinions which I won’t go into great detail here but from what I see sea-level rise is the basis for this claim? Was “global warming” an issue when Camille pushed an equally-high storm surge into the same region in 1969? Was “global warming” an issue when the 1935 Labor Day hurricane pushed a 20-plus foot storm surge into Florida? What about the Galveston hurricane of 1900?
Global warming must have been around for a long time for all of these significantly tall storm surges. Wonder what the energy companies were building then?
It’d be so much easier to preach eco-friendliness than scare tactics. At least people will respond to truth.

Bulldust earlier was refering to the concept of joint and several liability. All the plaintiffs have to do is get a jury to agree that company X was responsible for 0.001% of the problem and they will bear the full burden. Who was responsible for the levees and who used the gasoline will not matter one wit.

Be careful what you wish for, Anthony, you just might get it. The federal courts of the United States are not places of pure fairness and truth and light. Precedent rules, and there is already plenty of precedent, all the way to the Supreme Court, for wily mouthpieces to construct a substantial framework on which to hang a case for the claimants. Note the fact that the claimants do not present a chain of causes, but still allege that the facts support their claim and the court says go ahead and try it. If this ruling holds, the claimants will be able to refute any evidence to the contrary. There is no way that the facts you want to see adjudicated will see the light of day in this case. The only things on display will be mendacity and greed.

I posted the following comment to the WSJ article about this law suit:
“The first point that must be proved is that there is in fact anthropogenic global warming, an impossible task. However, if there are any federal or state agencies that are defendants, there is some worry that they make take a dive on this issue.
Next, plaintiffs’ must establish that the damage from Katrina was due to the ferocity of the storm rather than failed flood control systems. This too is daunting.
Finally, can this suit go forward without joinder of all necessary parties, including the Corps of Engineers and environmental organizations that successfully blocked many improvements to the flood control system from being built from about 1985 to Katrina? There may be jurisdictional barriers that prevent joinder of he Corps or other federal parties.
This is the type of case that could kill AGW once and for all if it is allowed to proceed.”
There are many other variations upon this theme that could also be mentioned. Was there a rise of the Gulf sea level? If so, was the rise caused by AGW? If not, what are the probative links that establish the main AGW related thesis of this law suit.
Cases like these provide the defendants with real weapons for them to win and undercut contrary major public policy initiatives.

Funny that he’d blog this but didn’t bother to blog the 2nd most powerful cyclone ever recorded in the East Pacific (180 mph w/ 220 mph wind gusts), despite the fact that it weakened greatly soon afterward.
Please blog unusual hurricanes, if only for nothing but to say weather is not climate.

Steve Huntwork (10:10:19) :
“Anyway, like I said, hurricane Katrina hit the State of Mississippi and the eye of the storm was miles away from New Orleans.”
This is my last comment on this subject–promise. I make this comment just in case there is a WUWT reader truly interested in knowing how near Katrina came to New Orleans (personally I’m bored by now, and expect others may be also).
At
http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/ms-word/TCR-AL122005_Katrina.doc
the National Hurricane Center have posted a report called “Tropical Cyclone Report, Hurricane Katrina” dated 20 December 2005 and updated 10 August 2006. Below I have copied four extracts from pages 3, 7, 8, and 9 of that report.
In summary of those extracts: Katrina’s eye was 25 to 30 nautical miles across and its center passed within about 20 nautical miles of downtown New Orleans after having made landfall at Buras, Louisiana. The eye ultimately passed over the mouth of the Pearl River, at the Louisiana/Mississippi border.
Hence the western eyewall was over downtown New Orleans. The eye passed directly over a section of town called “New Orleans East.”
Here are the extracts from the report (all copy/paste verbatim):
From page 3:
The hurricane then made landfall, at the upper end of Category 3 intensity with estimated maximum sustained winds of 110 kt, near Buras, Louisiana at 1110 UTC 29 August. Katrina continued northward and made its final landfall near the mouth of the Pearl River at the Louisiana/Mississippi border, still as a Category 3 hurricane with an estimated intensity of 105 kt.
From page 7:
It is worth noting that Katrina was likely at Category 4 strength with maximum sustained winds of about 115 kt near 0900 UTC 29 August, a couple of hours before the center made landfall near Buras, LA. Due to the large (~25-30 n mi) radius of maximum winds, it is possible that sustained winds of Category 4 strength briefly impacted the extreme southeastern tip of Louisiana in advance of landfall of the center.
From page 8:
While the intensity of Katrina was Category 3 as the center of the eye made its closest approach (about 20 n mi) to the east of downtown New Orleans, the strongest winds corresponding to that intensity were likely present only over water to the east of the eye.
From page 9:
The massive storm surge produced by Katrina, even though it had weakened from Category 5 intensity the previous day to Category 3 at landfall in Louisiana, can be generally explained by the huge size of the storm. Katrina had on 29 August a large (about 25-30 n mi) radius of maximum winds and a very wide swath of hurricane force winds that extended at least 75 n mi to the east from the center.

So does this mean I can sue people for being stupid? Or would I sue their parents for contributing to their stupidity?