Buffalo Creek : A Small Valley

The mill creek watershed is 166 square miles with 450,000 people. The main sources of water are rivers, aquifers, and rainwater. The major body of water is the Ohio River. The land around it is hilly.The Mill Creek lies at the heart, soul, and industrial center of Greater Cincinnati. This 28-mile stream begins in Liberty Township, travels through 34 communities, and flows into the Ohio River just west of downtown Cincinnati. The Mill Creek Watershed has withstood two centuries of urbanization and is poised for a comeback. The Mill Creek drew settlers over 200 years ago looking for rich, fertile farmland and water power to support industry, ultimately building Cincinnati into a prosperous industrial powerhouse.

lives were ended as a result of this unnatural disaster, most of them civilian. The people

After the typhoon, the environment was made safer for the survivors as a lot of the radioactive materials was washed away.

However, the dams were of faulty construction. Dam number one which caused the flooding was constructed of coarse mining refuse that Pittston had dumped into the Middle Fork of Buffalo Creek starting in 1968. This dam failed first on the heels of heavy rains. The water from Dam number three then took out dams number two and then number one. Dam number three had simply

More than 200 homes were destroyed. 185 miles of roads and15 miles of railways were damaged. Ash clogged sewage systems, damaged cars and buildings, and temporarily shut down air traffic over the Northwest. According to YourkVid” “The Nurses were crying because immerse me in a tub of water and take sponges and scrape out my wounds. And when the doctor came in he said you did not do a good enough job. They had to take me back a second time, they had to put me on morphine at that point I was in such pain.

At 7:45 AM, as the men were doing repair work, water started to flow down the valley. Multiple lives could potentially have been saved if residents of the Buffalo Hallow were informed of the potential disaster and magnitude of its occurrence. The Pittston Coal Company ignored warnings from all major government departments like the mining bureau, the National Guard, the State Police, and even the local sheriff’s office. At 7:59 AM, the dam officially collapsed and lead to major blasts as boiling yellow suffer coal deposits came in contact with rushing water from the stream. At 8:01 AM, a huge outburst of 130 million gallons of water stream swept away the whole Buffalo Creek and drifted along all the coal manufacturing waste with it. This tragedy claimed 123 lives, injured 1000 and also left 4000 people homeless. Alongside these statistics, the disaster left countless scars on the survivors and the citizens of West Virginia. In an attempt to absolve The Pittson Coal Company from any legal responsibility, company officials insisted the flood was “an act of God”. They argued that there absolutely nothing with the dam expect that it

The Buffalo Creek flood of West Virginia is believed to be the most devastating coal relate disaster in West Virginia history. The flood occurred in the Buffalo Creek area of Logan County on February 26, 1972 when three dams broke and released 132 million gallons of water and coal waste known by miners as “gob,” and is a thick sludge-like material. The gob contains many toxic chemicals and pollutants such as mercury and arsenic that are left behind from the coal mining process. The wastewater would lie in settling ponds and dams until it could be properly disposed of. The water that was left over from processing coal would be disposed of in two different ways. Some of the water would be pumped from the dam back to the “tipple”, otherwise

One of the events that stood out was the incident of the last train to leave Houston at 9:45 a.m. The train contained 95 passengers. When the train left, the tracks were completely washed out. Passengers were then forced to transfer to a relief train in order to complete their journey. Unfortunately, since there was a lot of debris on the track, the progress at which the train was moving at was at the pace of a crawl. When the train tried to return, the rising water blocked its path preventing it from moving. 10 travelers decided to leave the train and go to a lighthouse where 200 people were already at. The 85 travelers that remained on the train were killed by a storm surge. Another big story that was known among the deaths of people was about the 90 orphan children and the 10 sisters from St. Mary’s Orphans Asylum that died. Orphans were found tied together with a cloth line to a nun. This was because the nuns had promised to the orphan children they would never let go no matter what and to keep them close. A witness with the name of Smith Austin said, “Tress began to fall state shingles, planks sand debris of every imaginable kind were being hurled through the air…” Anna Delz was one of the survivors of the storm. Anna Delz was thrown into the water and found 18 miles away from her

The large amount of rain caused the South Fork Dam to collapse on May 31, 1889 at 3:10 p.m.. The lake drained in only forty minutes causing twenty million tons of water to flood the area. The water moved at forty miles per hour going over everything in its path. Thirty-three train engines were even pulled into the water. The town of South Fork was uphill so most were able to get away. Although, at this point twenty to thirty houses were destroyed and four people were dead. Johnstown was still fourteen miles away and yet to be hit. Finally, fifty-seven minutes after the dam collapsed, Johnstown was hit by the flood. The people of Johnstown were not expecting this, so most were carried away by the flood. The Johnstown Flood of 1889 claimed 2,209 lives. It is believed that this has one of the biggest losses of life in the United States. In total ninety-nine families were killed by the natural disaster and seven hundred seventy-seven people were never identified. Sixteen hundred homes were gone and there was seventeen million dollars in property damage. It took a total of five years to rebuild Johnstown. Therefore, The Johnstown Flood of 1889 was one of the worst natural

After it was over, the flood had destroyed 507 homes, damaged 936 homes, left over 4,000 people homeless, swept away 30 trailers and 600 automobiles, destroyed 30 businesses, washed out sections of the railroad and 10 bridges, and knocked out telephone, sewage, water and power services (Nugent 146). Over 1,000 residents sustained injuries and 125 people were killed, 7 bodies were never found (Nugent 146). “Victims lay crushed against bridges, wedged between railroad cars, swinging grotesquely from tree branches” (Nugent 151). In the days following the disaster, as the extent of the devastation unfolded, Pittston “remained silent, without even a word of condolence for the victims” (Nugent 156). When an official finally made a statement, he

How is it possible that over 1,700 people could die and it not make it to the front cover of the newspapers? This seems impossible, but that's exactly what happened back in 1865. April 27, 1865 the Sultana exploded and over 1,700 people were killed. Sad to say but this event barely made it to the newspapers because of Abraham's Lincoln's death. At the time of this event a war had just ended and Abraham lincoln had just died and everyone was worried about the funeral at the time of this disaster. Many lives were taken when the Sultana exploded and sank on August 27, 1865 ¨More people died on the Sultana than on the Titanic (1,503) or on the Lusitania (1,198)¨ (Billings, and Henry 156).

For instance, around 500 people were violently drowned to death by the rapid waters rising into homes and communities. Many people lost friends, and loved ones to this flood. Many tragically lost their homes and jobs too. Homes were destroyed, jobs were taken down, and people became devastated and depressed. A lot of people were able to go live will relatives, or friends, but a majority of them had nowhere to go.

BOGALUSA is located in southeastern Louisiana, approximately 45 miles north of New Orleans, in what is known as the Pearl River Valley. Its name is taken from the Choctaw people who inhabited the region before white people entered the area at the turn of the twentieth century. In Choctaw language the words bogue lusa means "dark or smoky waters," which describes the flowing creek that runs through the middle of the city. During the 1960s, Bogalusa was, and remains, the largest municipality in Washington Parish, with a population of 20,000 people. In 1906, Goodyear Industries of Buffalo, New York developed Bogalusa as a mill town. When brothers Charles and Frank Goodyear brought their migrating lumber operation to southeastern Louisiana, they found a place of virgin pine forest, a flowing creek, white sands, and the Choctaw people. Before long, the Choctaw were driven out and the Goodyear brothers were well on their way to constructing their "Magic City." From Buffalo, the Goodyear brothers cut a wide swath down through the Appalachian foothills, setting up lumber camps and mill towns.

With human development, industrial pollution and other factors all contribute to the deteriorated condition of the river, which makes it difficult to determine the dams’ environmental impact in isolation. CITE That said, the current operations of the dam hamper and potentially prevent environmental improvement of the Colorado. In order to preserve some semblance of the Colorado ecosystem, man must restore the natural processes that created the ecosystem. The real question is how to do that, whether via dam decommission or a less extreme policy change.

Homes were mildewed from the storm, as well people were left cold without heat and there just was not enough descent housing; however, the money that was raised for the victims was being set aside and I feel that this was a problem that the red cross encountered while handling money.