Book Review of 'Buffalo Creek Disaster'

Gerald M. Stern’s novel, The Buffalo Creek Disaster, helps students better understand the civil procedure process by describing the process through an actual case Stern himself litigated. The case began in 1972 after a dam collapsed in Buffalo Creek, West Virginia, killing 125 people and destroying many homes. Other than property damage and loss of loved ones, those who survived suffered what Stern referred to as psychic impairment, or mental suffering. Stern’s lawsuit involved 625 plaintiffs suing the Pittston Coal Group, or the stockholder of the Buffalo Mining Company, for compensatory and punitive damages. Stern had to choose a court and a judge, decide how much relief the plaintiffs were seeking, depose witnesses, and work with the defendant’s counsel

Have you ever thought about living in the late 1800s? Sometimes you have to do work that you have never done before. In the novel I Survived The Great Chicago Fire, 1871 by Lauren Tarshis is a Novel about a boy that was forced to move to Chicago. His family had to go to Chicago to get work done. Oscars personality is shaped by the time period in which he lived.

Beside these arguments, there is also a more quantitative side to the debate. The ecological detriments of the Glen Canyon Dam have been well-documented. Extensive changes were brought about in the Colorado River ecosystem by the construction of the Glen Canyon Dam. Most of these alterations negatively affected the functioning of the system and the native aquatic species of the river. The reduced supply and transport of

Communities that was adjacent to Buffalo Creek. When operation of the mine commenced in 1945 the practice dumping of slurry or coal mining waste into the hollow also began. Coal companies who operated upstream of the communities dammed Buffalo Creek to facilitate mining operations, which created an earth dam that held back 130 million gallons of water and coal waste. On average, a thousand tons of slurry had to be dumped every day. Although there were many complaints about the safety of the coal company and its regulation of the Buffalo Creek site, nothing was ever done to improve the dam’s conditions. The Buffalo Creek project had three earth dams ranging in

Just after Dam No. 3 started to show symptoms of collapsing, the Pittson Company sent a bulldozer to dig a drainage pitch in an attempt to alleviate some pressure.

On May 31, 1889, a 35-foot-high wall of water, set loose by days of rain and a failed dam, rushed into the city of Johnstown, Pennsylvania. In its wake, most of the town was destroyed and more than 2,200 lives were lost. The Johnstown Flood was one of the worst natural disasters ever seen in the United States and brought in relief from all over the nation and world. For Clara Barton, the Johnstown Flood disaster was the first test for her newly formed Red Cross. About 3:00 p.m. on May 31, 1889, water had backed up to the point where it began to spill over the South Ford Dam. It wasn't long before the entire dam broke, sending 20 million tons of water rushing down the narrow Conemaugh Valley. The "terrible wave" reportedly sounded like a freight

|collapsed in the Buffalo Creek Valley. Over 130 million gallons of water and waste material devastated Buffalo Creek's sixteen |

Streams formed that had never been there before, and rivers in the surrounding area rose more than a foot per hour. Johnstown had water in its streets, which was nothing new to them, but this time it was different. There was an air of fear around them. Surrounding railroad tracks were washed out throughout the day as the storm progressed. Eventually, nothing could move east or west, and all trains were stopped. Overnight, people at the club upriver noticed that the lake rose two feet over night. The spillway definitely couldn’t handle more water. Debris accumulated around the “innovative” fish screens that were put in place to make fishing easy and leisurely for the wealthy. The damns engineer left at 11:30 in hops of getting a message to Johnstown. In addition, a crew gathered in an effort to free spillway and raise the top of the

It was about 4:00, on game day against Courtland, when I told the team we should probably start our pregame warmups. This consisted of everything that a normal high school baseball team does before a game. We started off by taking a jog to the flagpole on the centerfield fence, which is also where we stretched . We followed that up with getting a light toss in just good enough to get our arms ready for a game. Courtland was then announced and right after that was my team, the Eastern View Cyclones. The national anthem was then played and directly after it ended the umpire called out, “Play

The Standing Rock Sioux Tribe currently fights to save its only water source from natural gas and oil contamination. This troubling current event has a somewhat forgotten historical analogue where very similar themes presented themselves. The Kinzua Dam Controversy, which took place in the 1950’s and early 1960’s, resulted in the displacement of over 600 Seneca Indian families and the acquisition of a large tract of traditional Seneca Land for dam building. Additionally, the acquisition of Seneca land represented a breach of “The Treaty with the Six Nations of 1794,” which explicated prevented such action by the US Government. The dam and its construction, which primarily benefitted Pittsburg, inspired a heated discourse concerning the ethics of native relocation.

When construction began in 1927, the Swift River was redirected from its riverbed and through a diversion tunnel. On August 14th, 1939 that tunnel was sealed with rock. Over the next seven years the waters of the Quabbin Reservoir slowly rose behind the newly completed Winsor Dam, an earth-filled structure 2,640 feet long, rising 170 feet above the riverbed, and the slightly smaller Goodnough Dike. The water seeped into the old cellar holes, and gradually submerged the roads that had linked the towns. It swallowed

There was a family early in the morning at 9ish there was a big black cloud coming towards they all huddled in the middle of the room. They got wet towels and covered there mouth and cracks in the door and windows. When they looked at the black cloud they saw birds flying away and animals running away from the cloud. It was total darkness and there small house was getting hit with dirt really hard. They were in the middle of the room till the sandstorm ended. This happened to a lot of people in different places they were most common in Texas, Kansas, New Mexico and colorado they were hit with hundreds of storms. These big storms are one of the biggest natural disasters in America's history. These big storm threatened so many people of the population.

The Three Gorges Dam was not worthy of being constructed. It may be environmentally friendly, yet the sacrifices made in creating it was much more important than the pollutant-free energy it creates. The increasing height of the waters has put numerous people and places at risk; some even already submerged in the tides. Over 100,000 acres of precious farmland was demolished by the rising water, in which was approximately one-third of all of China’s farmable land. The tides also destroyed ancient sites, villages, towns, cities, and much more. Also, it has risked many people’s lives. Due to the dam being built on two fault lines, the risk of earthquakes has skyrocketed. Additionally, if the dam breaks from an earthquake, the water will flow,

The evening of December 11, 1995, was a special time for Aaron Feuerstein, CEO of Malden Mills. A small surprise 70th birthday party quietly was held in his honor at a local Boston restaurant. But Feuerstein’s life took a dramatic turn that evening for a different reason: A boiler at his company’s plant exploded, setting off a fire that injured 33employees and destroyed three of the factory’s century-old buildings. Malden Mills was a privately owned firm, with Feuerstein owning a majority share. The firm was located in a small Massachusetts town, Methuen, and employed nearly 3,000 people in the economically depressed area. The fire was a devastating blow for the community. According

Everybody feels this way at some point in their life. The feeling that you don’t fit in at a certain setting. This quote is telling us that Abby, the female protagonist, doesn’t feel safe in this environment. We can tell this by the author’s use of the word “screamed”. When a person is screamed at the response to that is usually fear or rage. Also we can tell because Abby’s true self does fit in here, but she doesn’t want to be herself so she tries to distance herself from past hobbies. This is important to the development of the story, it reveals to us how Abby is dynamic.