Thursday, April 26, 2018

Houston’s Floodpains (ahem, Floodplains)

When Hurricane Harvey headed for Houston, Texans braced for an expected large amount of rain and heavy winds. What they did not expect was the catastrophic flooding that took place in the city.

Wednesday, April 25, 2018

Back to Back Cats

In the last week, there have been several news stories about the recent island-wide power outage in Puerto Rico, the tenuous condition of Puerto Rico’s power grid, and the fact that hurricane season is right around the corner. Last Wednesday, a construction vehicle removing a fallen electrical tower got too close to an energized line and caused an electrical ground fault that led to an island-wide blackout. Luckily, power was not out across the island for long, but the outage once again drew attention to Puerto Rico’s efforts to rebuild following Hurricane Maria. Puerto Rico faced difficulties with its power grid even before Hurricane Maria made landfall, but Maria’s high winds and flooding damaged 75 percent of the island’s distribution lines. Despite the progress that has been made since Maria struck, it is clear that Puerto Rico has not fully recovered from Maria’s devastation. 

Friday, April 13, 2018

The Boom Shift - Chemical Plant Explosion Claims and the Possible Adoption of Corporate Regulation Where Government Regulation is Absent

On the morning of March 15, 2018, a large explosion erupted at the Tri-Chem Industries chemical plant in Cresson, Texas, approximately 25 miles southwest of Fort Worth. The explosion left two workers badly injured and another presumed dead. According to 2017 Hood County records of the company’s chemical inventory, it has been reported that Tri-Chem’s Cresson plant stored chemicals that were toxic, flammable and corrosive yet the company had no emergency response plans in its files.