The biggest wetlands story in North America has been the re-plumbing of the Mississippi River watershed which drains something on the order of one-third of the entire continental United States. The following links highlight some of the impacts this has had on coastal Louisiana, Mississippi, and near-shore barrier islands and seafloor of the Gulf of Mexico:

• Gulf Barrier Islands Now More Vulnerable

  • Hurricane Katrina Photographs August 30, 2005

  • Louisiana Coastal Land Loss (web site)

    • (computer simulation). 3 minutes 44 seconds
      (RealVideo Dial-up 1mb)     (Realvideo Broadband 6mb)     (AVI format 54mb)

• Before and After Photo Comparisons: Chandeleur Islands (Katrina)

• Before and After Photo Comparisons: Dauphin Island (Katrina)

• NOAA Aerial survey of regions affected by Hurricane Katrina

• NOAA Aerial survey of regions affected by Hurricane Rita

• The Disappearing Delta PBS "NOW". includes 16 minute RealVideo clip.

• Nature's Revenge: Louisiana's Vanishing Wetlands

  • Part I: Sinking into the Sea (RealAudio 11 minutes 30 seconds)

  • Part II: An Unlikely Activist (RealAudio 12 minutes 32 seconds)

  • Part III: Can the Plan to Save the Coast Really Work? (RealAudio 11 minutes 47 seconds)

  • Part IV: Hurricane Risk for New Orleans (RealAudio 20 minutes 12 seconds) Editorial note: This audio clip could also be titled "What They Knew THREE YEARS BK (before Katrina)"

• Louisiana Office of Coastal Restoration and Management (web site)

• Environmental Atlas of the Lake Pontchartrain Basin