engineers and volunteers had a chance to test how ready they were when the dike suddenly sprung a leak. you have a joint. every six feet. those joints, we believe, started failing and so, we started getting water on the dry side of our levy system. all right. our reynolds wolf is live for us there in moorhead, minnesota. made his way up yesterday. and reynolds, i know you have seen this river and seen it this time of year when it begins to flood. every single year. but is there anything that seems different this time? are they in worse shape on better shape than you have seen before? reporter: i would say overwhelmingly much better shape. there s a sense of calm here and part of it is preparation. they got things started on march 1st. over a million sandbags cover both sides of the river. amazing job. on a personal level, i drove up here from the dwin cities. yesterday, the crew flew in and coming in seeing this area, from
against is a category 1. here, we face category 5. we probably could not afford to protect against a 1,000-year event. was katrina a 100-year storm? i mean, katrina was a great storm, but what flooded new orleans, was actually simply design failures by engineers when the levy system, the flood walls collapsed on the drainage canals. they weren t even overtopped. the water was two feet below the top. it was a design issue. is it because of what they were built of or poor design? poor design primarily. the flood walls that collapsed during katrina were designed
they call aaffectionately snow birds down there when it s cold up north they come down south and they are great it s great for them and great for the economy and jobs. that would be one example of a need to work collaboratively with the local community and local stakeholders as well as state and local officials to come up with the right solution. i remember a few years back in texas using that same local stakeholder input approach. we were able to come up with a win/win proposition. you are familiar with the levy wall. yes, sir. there was a need to improve the levy system down there and protect property values and to make flood insurance affordable. but in consultation i remember the county judge there they put a bond election on the ballot and came up with a dual-use
in 24 to 36-hour period. the main threat will be from storm surge and tidal flooding. we can of course talk numbers and evacuations, you were here when katrina hit, we have seen storms roll through the region. nothing like what we saw seven years ago almost today. on personal note, your family is here, this is where you call home. and to know isaac can roll through here seven years to the date seven years to the day. it is prophetic. you know, this isaac, is to be respected. and we are prepared for it. we are prepared for the worse and hoping and praying for the best but it is not katrina. right now, still a tropical storm. it ll strengthen. the big thing is it is sprawling and it will dump a lot of rain. so we will have to be we rery of that. but again within not the type it doesn t pack the punch right new that ka green did. we know the punch of katrina was made epic because of the levy system the failure of the levyes. it won t have been as bad as it
we start with tamron hall from new orleans. with katrina, the biggest concern, as the same with isaac, the storm surge. that s what we are concerned about. can residents there compare it to katrina? of course they can. this is wh they lived through. a lot of people are suffering, as you know, psychological issues a. a result of what happened in katrina. many people, still seven years later, are still 3w50building t. when have you a monster storm like isaac barreling and headlines that say new orleans in the cross hairs, it would be impossible for any individual not to think about katrina. but things changed. i talked to a number of parish presidents in this area. people who have felt the impact of katrina and were very vocal and critical of the army corps of engineers and they all unanimously expressed great confidence in the levy system, billions spent. still a billion dollars on the table to further improve the levy system here.