Search

Seismic St. Louis

Emily Sekine
Annotation of
In response to

I'm interested in better understanding the ongoing geological processes that shape St. Louis and the Mississippi Valley region. So far, I've been looking into the history of seismicity in the region, focusing on the fascinating but little known history of the New Madrid earthquakes of 1811 and 1812 -- the most devastating earthquakes to have hit the US east of the Rockies. I've also been exploring how St. Louis and surrounding areas are dealing with the possibility of another earthquake occurring in the future. According to one article I read, one of the biggest uncertainties is what would happen to the heavily engineered Mississippi River in the case of another major tremblor. The shaking could break the levees, flooding wide areas along the river and creating cascading effects. The flow of the river might also reverse completely, as occurred during the New Madrid earthquakes.

On these possibilities and the lack of scientific consensus surrounding intraplate seismicity in this zone, see this article in The Atlantic.

On current efforts to create earthquake hazard maps in St. Louis, see this overview on the US Geological Survey site.

For a deeper dive into the history of the New Madrid earthquakes, see this book by historian of science Conevery Bolton Valencius. 

pece_annotation_1473871251

erin_tuttle
Annotation of
In response to

Emergency response is viewed in the film from the perspective of a potential patient rather than the organizations or medical professionals. From this perspective it is easy to see how the public can lose faith in the ability of their hospitals and doctors to protect them. The public did not have the information to understand that the emergency response groups were working as hard as possible, instead many people were angry at the time it would take for an ambulance to arrive, or the fact that the hospitals had to turn away patients. This emphasizes the importance of communication as the emergency responders would have had more success if the public had been cooperative, but the public could not be cooperative while their feared for their lives and the lives of their families.

pece_annotation_1480894067

erin_tuttle
Annotation of
In response to

Emergency response is addressed in terms of aid workers involved in a long term aid project for war torn or poverty stricken communities. The article focused on the risks that these health workers take due to the greater likelihood of violence against health workers in these environments when compared to the average city hospital.

pece_annotation_1474748694

erin_tuttle
Annotation of
In response to

The bibliography shows this article was written with a significant amount of historical research into both the incidents discussed and also the materials and technical findings of the investigations.

pece_annotation_1474993150

erin_tuttle
Annotation of
In response to
  • I looked at current French visa laws which allow for a number of humanitarian requests, including family, fear of life, and medical treatment. The current protocols do still allow for easily obtainable short stay medical visas which require the medical report from a French doctor, the long term visas have a similar application but are more challenging to obtain.
  • I also researched which countries have significant numbers of tourists traveling for medical reasons, the countries in Europe, Northern America, and Asia have the most applications for medical stays in order to access otherwise unavailable treatment. There is also however significant travel to countries with less developed health infrastructure and regulation for inexpensive treatment.
  • Finally, as this article focused only on the normal application process of immigrants I looked into how the humanitarian allowances for residence in France was effected during the recent increase in refugees traveling through Europe. France is actually planning to close some refugee camps against the arguments of humanitarian groups due to strain on resources, while the government wishes to find alternative locations for the refugees they claim the camp in Calais will be closed by winter regardless.

Source: The Guardian sept. 26th 2016 edition

pece_annotation_1476122177

erin_tuttle
Annotation of
In response to
  • “The response to the disaster was recognized as a bureaucratic nightmare that, regardless of the intent of the federal and state governments, appeared to homeowners as a sign of their having been abandoned.” (16)
  • “And the patterns with the family too. A family is—for as close as we—were and I mean every birthday, with a big family… And now, it’s the closeness that’s all gone. And it’s not just the distance. You can blame it on the distance, use the distance as an excuse. But even when we get together, nobody wants to stay. Everyone wants to get home.” (12)
  • “I haven’t had a mail box in three years, OK. I mean symbolically that’s it right now. I don’t even have a mailbox. You know, if you want to put it in one sentence. I am just tired of not having a mailbox, ya know, because I don’t know where I live.” (9)