Hurrican Katrina

As globalization increases the need to accommodate commerce will also include a variety of ways for transporting the freight. With no limitation of what can be of use logistically; however there are potential of consequences when nature and human activities intersect. The focus of this paper will be Hurricane Katrina and what role did humankind activities play in the devastation that followed after the category 5 storm hit the Gulf of Mexico in August 2005 (Light & Rolston, 2003).

The case in point of Hurricane Katrina is an example of how humankinds activities impact the environment with unintentional consequences. The Mississippi River delta is a form of sediments that settles by the natural flow of deposits from currents in the water. With this type of activity nature creates its own landform in a sense nature will take care of its self. The Mississippi River in New Orleans, Louisiana is a major source of commerce that travels in and out of the city. The creation of the canal by humankind to guide the sea traffic contributes to erosion of sediments. This action causes freshwater to mix with saltwater, which results in the destroying the sediment rather than wetlands forming in the natural environment.

As engineers create the canals in the Mississippi River the intentions are to increase the flow of the amount of travel for boats and other sea vessels to travel. However, with this result in the sediment process of replenishing the wetlands to cease from, because the saltwater mixed with the freshwater will cause the vegetation not to grow. This activity is a result of the levees that are built by humankind to hinder the process and the water does not have a natural flow and will cause the water to flow into the city where thousands of lives are lost. With the city of New Orleans at or below sea level and the manmade canals and levees is a wall of water waiting to be released from the restriction of the current lines (Light & Rolston, 2003)....