New Orleans drainage officials say past mistakes won't be repeated

As forecasters watch the tropical cyclone in the Gulf, New Orleans Sewerage and Water Board officials say they're putting into action lessons learned from past mistakes.

The thought of a tropical storm encountering New Orleans this week was sure to cause worries among many New Orleans residents, as the Sewerage & Water Board has struggled to keep streets clear during recent intense rainfall.

Kaitlin Tymrak, SWBNO's general superintendent, says she believes they won't repeat the mistakes that led to street flooding in Lakeview on July 11.

"We have simplified our procedures around that operation, have retrained staff, and are re-posting some of this procedures so that it is very clear," Tymrak said.

She says they also are better prepared to handle power fluctuations like the ones that caused pumps to trip offline during Tropical Storm Arthur last month

"You know, as soon as the details of that became a little bit clearer to us we were touch with the manufacturer and were able to reduce those settings to allow for a wider range of voltage fluctuations for the frequency changers to remain online," said Tymrak.