Assessing the season: LSU hurricane experts learned lessons during Hurricane S...( r of the Coastal Studies Institute at L...),Health

r of the Coastal Studies Institute at LSU, made some interesting discoveries about Hurricane Ivan's effects on certain barrier islands. Since 1995, Stone said, the northeastern Gulf of Mexico has taken several severe hurricane hits, most notable of which were Opal in 1995 and Ivan in September, 2004. "Remarkably, the Florida Panhandle and Alabama coasts experienced little to no beach erosion for a decade and a half prior to the landfall of Opal," he said. Studies conducted by institute researchers have monitored some of the worst-impacted areas for more than 10 years and captured the full effects of Ivan and Opal. Their work detailed the recovery process after Opal and the response of barrier islands to Ivan. Stone said they discovered that, while Ivan was a slightly more powerful storm than Opal, the geological response along the coasts was nearly identical in both instances. Although both storms caused severe beach erosion, he said, much of that sand was pushed across the islands as massive deposits protruding into adjacent bays by several hundred feet. Stone's research showed that while both hurricanes were major, actual sand loss from the barriers was minimal.

According to Stone, National Geographic's television arm is producing a documentary on disasters around the world and representatives will be coming to LSU's campus in the coming months to find out more about hurricanes along the Northern Gulf Coast.

Ivor van Heerden, director of LSU's Center for the Study of Public Health Impacts of Hurricanes, and researchers from the center were involved in a number of different aspects of hurricane preparedness during the 2004 season. Under contract from the Louisiana Office of Emergency Preparedness and the Federal Emergency Management Agency, they helped develop a hurricane scenario for the "Hurricane Pam Exercise." This 10-day event involved a large number of parish, state and federal agencies in the development of a plan of how to respond if a
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Contact: Rob Anderson
rander8@lsu.edu
225-578-3871
Louisiana State University
16-Dec-2004


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