Photos: Engineering New Orleans, post-Katrina

The levee protecting this New Orleans neighborhood from the 17th Street Canal breached during Hurricane Katrina, allowing floodwaters to severely damage or destroy many houses in the area.

Now, the wall has been repaired, and its old I-style structure, which simply had piles driven down into the soil below sea level, has been replaced with a new T-style, which have steel sheet piles driven up to 67 feet below sea level, as well as three rows of steel beams that are diagonally driven down to as much as 110 feet below sea level. You can see where the new construction is on the wall. It is the lighter color, whereas the brownish-colored part of the wall is the old construction.

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