New Orleans Flood Map
This free web site provides the most accurate information currently available to us and is intended to aid people affected by Hurricane Katrina. But please note, errors may exist due to the complex local hydrodynamics and the changing conditions.
If you are aware of more precise information, please contribute this data by including the date, time, and location of the water depth or water's edge observation (street intersection or latitude/longitude) and e-mail to Flood Map Administrator.. Again, the information presented on this site is not faultless and in some cases will be incorrect.
How was this data compiled?
Three data sources are used to calculate the water depth estimations:
1) Lidar data provided by Louisiana State University was used to develop a high-resolution 3D terrain model.
2) NOAA images obtained from Digital Globe and the NOAA web site were used to approximate the water's edge.
3) Water depth values from additional sources in the flooded areas are utilized for ground truthing. Google Maps provided the street information, in addition to satellite imagery collected Wednesday, August 31 at 10 AM, which can be viewed by selecting the "Katrina" button. This imagery does not encompass entire area, but will hopefully be useful to many. Aerial photographs of the areas affected by Katrina are available at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Katrina site. The images are not rotated with north facing up and could be difficult to interpret if you are not familiar with the area.
4) A fellow Google web site www.scipionus.com was used to spot check our data with reported values posed to the site.
Instructions:
SHOW DATA - Click upon your area of interest and a marker will appear showing the estimated maximum and current water depths at that location. If this value reflects "0.0 ft" no standing water should be expected. A value of "4.5 ft" means that approximately 4.5 feet of standing water should be expected. "No Data Available" reflects the absence of information at that location.
ZOOM - Use the "+" and "-" buttons to zoom in and out. The default is set to allow users to quickly identify their area of interest.
PAN - Click and drag the mouse to pan around the map.