Katrina victims inundate Army Corps with trillions in claims
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers faces more than 489,000 claims for the damage and deaths in the post-Katrina flooding; one claim alone seeks $3 quadrillion in damages, almost all of it for personal injury; this is 3 followed by 15 zeros — about 250 times the U.S. GDP
Tens of thousands of people whose property was destroyed when Hurricane Katrina overwhelmed New Orleans’s protective levees have filed claims demanding the government pay astronomical sums that would be enough money to make multimillionaires of everyone in Louisiana. The Army Corps of Engineers received 247 claims from residents, businesses, and government agencies seeking $1 billion or more, according to the agency. This is the tip of a very large iceberg: The corps, which designed and built the city’s storm protections, faces more than 489,000 claims for the damage and deaths in the post-Katrina flooding. USA Today’s Brad Heath writes that the claims are so massive the government could never hope to pay them. Rather, they are the hopeful
