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Rhetoric Team Description

Ian Ferris describes the methods and focus of the Rhetoric Field Team of the Austin Anthropocene Field Campus.

Seismic St. Louis

Emily Sekine
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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. 

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maryclare.crochiere
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The policy deals with Institutions for Mental Diseases (IMD), which are defined as facilities with at least 16 beds, and focuses on diagnosing, treating, and caring for those with mental diseases. There are additional ways to determine whether a facility is an IMD. Once this determination is made, this policy aims to set limits on IMDs, as well as specify which services they should provide.

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maryclare.crochiere
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I looked up how other countries and areas of the world fund emergency response, like ambulance agencies. I also looked to see in which countries these services are most developed. The last point I researched was the size of the area affected by Chernobyl and the population density of that area.

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maryclare.crochiere
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"In the interest of sustainable and socially legitimate solutions, arguably decisions to even the technical responses to disasters should not be left to scientists and engineers alone"

This statement is very thought-provoking and is not exactly expected in a research article - that a scientist's or engineer's decision should be influenced or editied by those without such specific education or expertise.

-balancing point between safety and profitability

-disaster did not happen as a chain of events that made it bound to occur at some point, it happened on a system that was in good shape

-over regulation of the industry and workers results in a lack of flexibility and therefore an inability to be creative in emergency situations

-need emergency response team to be skilled professionally and socially, but on a low budget - and very importantly - cooperation from nuclear corporations