Since Katrina, infrastructure shortcomings create resiliency fatigue

An American flag has been strategically placed on one of the massive beams supporting the Lake Borgne Surge Barrier, part of the New Orleans region hurricane and storm damage risk reduction system.

Completed in 2009 to close off the Mississippi River Gulf Outlet, the barrier is designed to decrease damage to the metropolitan area when a major hurricane pushes water from the Gulf of Mexico into the lakes that surround the city and neighboring parishes.  

The flag on the wall symbolizes pride and mourning, a reminder of the people it protects and a memorial for those who died 20 years ago when Hurricane Katrina hit. The failure of the federal levee system Aug. 29, 2005, claimed more than a thousand lives, displaced nearly a million people in the region and left permanent scars on New Orleans. 

Read more at Louisiana Illuminator