Wednesday, May 10, 2006

Barrier Reef

Why hasn't anyone floated the idea of a barrier reef for the Louisiana coastline. We certainly have enough debris. Like destroyed school buses. Drain the fluids, take them offshore and dump them. Or refrigerators. Recover the freon, take them offshore and dump them. Building materials. Same deal. Destroyed houses. Same deal. Take it offshore and heave it overboard.

I bet we have enough debris in this state right now to construct a barrier reef from Sabine Pass to the Pearl River. From what little I know about barrier reefs, they slow down wave action, let the coastline stabilize and protect the coast from storms.

Okay, this is probably a bone-headed idea. Someone educate me on why it isn't feasible.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Makes sense to me. Also sounds like good diving and fishing. Somebody show me a down side.

Anonymous said...

I think the gulf is way too deep off our coast to build a reef.

Pawpaw said...

According to these guys, "Approximately 38% of Gulf waters are shallow intertidal areas." Somewhere else, they define shallow intertidal at under 20 meters.

http://www.gulfbase.org/facts.php

Anonymous said...

20 meters is ~65 feet. That's deep. Plus,62%, the rest of the coast,is deeper than that. Plus, most of the debris is wood. It floats.

Anonymous said...

how long are those FEMA trailers?

You know someone would just love to recycle those into a reef, That way they could buy them all over again! ;)

Xavier said...

I could be wrong, but small polyp stoney coral does not live in the Gulf of Mexico around Mississippi/Louisiana. The SPSC is necessary to build reefs. There is large polyp stoney coral in the Gulf, but it a non-reef coral.

The key is to rebuild the barrier islands though........

Anonymous said...

Pensacola is full of sunken boats, planes, and other transport vehicles. The Russian Freighter, the 3 freighters, and various USN aircraft are wonderful diving adventures.

I think a few hundred cars, welded together, would make an excellent habitat for wildlife, an exciting diving destination, a great fishing hole, and hey, why not, a barrier for storms.

Admittedly, we have no coral, but we gots barnacles-a-plenty.

Anonymous said...

65 feet is not quite 11 fathoms...

I used to crab fish in 25 fathoms...