Latest Mississippi River Delta News: March 11, 2013

Second week of BP oil spill trial focuses on gross negligence
By Mark Schleifstein, The Times-Picayune (New Orleans). March 8, 2013.
“In the second week of the BP oil spill trial in New Orleans, lawyers for the Plaintiffs Steering Committee and the Justice Department continued to plod through a long list of witnesses called to back up their contention that BP committed gross negligence and willful misconduct in actions before, during and after the blowout of its Macondo oil well nearly three years ago…” (Read more)

Forces collide as nature takes a stab at saving a coastal marsh — for free
By Bob Marshall, The Lens (New Orleans). March 8, 2013.
“Thirty-five miles south of New Orleans, the silt-laden Mississippi River intermittently rolls through a 150-foot gap that started opening on the river’s east bank during the Mardi Gras 2011 flood. The café-au-lait water rushes noisily through the channel it carved across an adjacent shell roadbed, then sweeps eastward toward marshes spreading to the horizon…” (Read more)

La. agencies to address ‘dead zone’ nutrients in the Gulf
By Amy Wold, The Advocate (Baton Rouge, La.). March 11, 2013.
“Four state agencies have begun work on a plan that will address Louisiana’s contributions to the nutrients that end up in the Gulf of Mexico and help create the “dead zone” of low oxygen that appears every summer…” (Read more)

Post Hurricanes Katrina and Isaac, experts discuss the challenges of living with water
By Benjamin Alexander-Bloch, The Times-Picayune. March 8, 2013.
“In a post-Hurricanes Katrina and Isaac metro New Orleans landscape, the challenges of living with water often are on residents’ minds. Still, the issue is typically discussed immediately after disasters, not so much in the interim periods “when the sun shines,” according to various speakers on Friday (March 6) at the annual Building Resilience Workshop at the University of New Orleans…” (Read more)