Katrina Was Predicted: Revisiting Warning Signs 20 Years Later

Science Quickly

Scientific American

Science

4.3 • 1.4K Ratings

🗓️ 29 August 2025

⏱️ 23 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Twenty years after Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans, Scientific American revisits the storm’s tragic legacy and the scientific warnings that went unheeded. Senior editor Mark Fischetti shares his experience reporting on the city’s vulnerability years before the levees broke, and our senior Earth and environment editor Andrea Thompson reflects on how hurricane preparedness has changed since. Recommended Reading See the Restore the Mississippi River Delta website Drowning New Orleans Protecting New Orleans “They Saw It Coming,” by Mark Fischetti, in the New York Times; September 2, 2005 Join the #SciAmInTheWild photography challenge for a chance to win a one-year Unlimited subscription to Scientific American—plus an exclusive bundle of gadgets and gear to level up your next adventure. See the rules for entry here. E-mail us at [email protected] if you have any questions, comments or ideas for stories we should cover! Discover something new every day: subscribe to Scientific American and sign up for Today in Science, our daily newsletter. Science Quickly is produced by Rachel Feltman, Fonda Mwangi, Kelso Harper and Jeff DelViscio. This episode was edited by Alex Sugiura. Shayna Posses and Aaron Shattuck fact-check the show. The theme music was composed by Dominic Smith. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:27.8	slash UK slash AI for people. For some of the For Scientific American Science quickly, I'm Rachel Feldman.
0:51.5	20 years ago, Hurricane Katrina became one of the deadliest storms ever to hit the U.S.
0:57.5	After sweeping along the Gulf Coast, wreaking havoc in Louisiana and Mississippi,
1:02.3	the massive storm ultimately led to 1,392 fatalities, according to the National Hurricane Center.
1:10.0	Katrina's destruction centered on the city of New Orleans,
1:13.2	where failing levees and flood walls left most of the city underwater
1:16.9	and displaced nearly all of its residents, some of them permanently.
1:22.2	The catastrophic aftermath of Hurricane Katrina was the result of numerous failures,
1:29.4	failures in infrastructure,
1:36.0	city maintenance, emergency management, and more. But the worst thing about this disaster might be that scientists saw it coming several years ahead of time, and one of Scientific American's own
1:41.8	had even tried to help spread the word.
1:45.0	Mark Fischetti, now a senior editor at Scientific American,
1:48.4	wrote about research on the inevitability of disaster in New Orleans for the magazine back in 2001.
1:54.7	He's here today to tell us about his experience covering the tragedy
	...

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