1.
Town
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A town is a human settlement larger than a village but smaller than a city. The size definition for what constitutes a town varies considerably in different parts of the world, the word town shares an origin with the German word Zaun, the Dutch word tuin, and the Old Norse tun. The German word Zaun comes closest to the meaning of the word. An early borrowing from Celtic *dunom, in English and Dutch, the meaning of the word took on the sense of the space which these fences enclosed. In England, a town was a community that could not afford or was not allowed to build walls or other larger fortifications. In the Netherlands, this space was a garden, more specifically those of the wealthy, in Old Norse tun means a place between farmhouses, and is still used in a similar meaning in modern Norwegian. If there was any distinction between toun and burgh as claimed by some, it did not last in practice as burghs, for example, Edina Burgh or Edinburgh was built around a fort and eventually came to have a defensive wall. In some cases, town is a name for city or village. Sometimes, the town is short for township. A places population size is not a determinant of urban character. In many areas of the world, as in India at least until recent times, in the United Kingdom, there are historical cities that are far smaller than the larger towns. Some forms of settlement, such as temporary mining locations, may be clearly non-rural. Towns often exist as governmental units, with legally defined borders. In the United States these are referred to as incorporated towns, in other cases the town lacks its own governance and is said to be unincorporated. Note that the existence of a town may be legally set forth through other means. In the case of planned communities, the town exists legally in the form of covenants on the properties within the town. Australian geographer Thomas Griffith Taylor proposed a classification of towns based on their age, although there is no official use of the term for any settlement. In Albanian qytezë means small city or new city, while in ancient times small residential center within the walls of a castle
2.
Louisiana
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Louisiana is a state located in the southern region of the United States. Louisiana is the 31st most extensive and the 25th most populous of the 50 United States and its capital is Baton Rouge and largest city is New Orleans. Louisiana is the state in the U. S. with political subdivisions termed parishes. The largest parish by population is East Baton Rouge Parish, Louisiana is bordered by Arkansas to the north, Mississippi to the east, Texas to the west, and the Gulf of Mexico to the south. Much of the lands were formed from sediment washed down the Mississippi River, leaving enormous deltas and vast areas of coastal marsh. These contain a rich southern biota, typical examples include birds such as ibis, there are also many species of tree frogs, and fish such as sturgeon and paddlefish. In more elevated areas, fire is a process in the landscape. These support a large number of plant species, including many species of orchids. Louisiana has more Native American tribes than any other state, including four that are federally recognized, ten that are state recognized. Before the American purchase of the territory in 1803, the current Louisiana State had been both a French colony and for a period, a Spanish one. In addition, colonists imported numerous African people as slaves in the 18th century, many came from peoples of the same region of West Africa, thus concentrating their culture. Louisiana was named after Louis XIV, King of France from 1643 to 1715, when René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle claimed the territory drained by the Mississippi River for France, he named it La Louisiane. The suffix -ana is a Latin suffix that can refer to information relating to an individual, subject. Thus, roughly, Louis + ana carries the idea of related to Louis, the Gulf of Mexico did not exist 250 million years ago when there was but one supercontinent, Pangea. As Pangea split apart, the Atlantic Ocean and Gulf of Mexico opened, Louisiana slowly developed, over millions of years, from water into land, and from north to south. The oldest rocks are exposed in the north, in such as the Kisatchie National Forest. The oldest rocks date back to the early Tertiary Era, some 60 million years ago, the history of the formation of these rocks can be found in D. Spearings Roadside Geology of Louisiana. The sediments were carried north to south by the Mississippi River
3.
Switzerland
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Switzerland, officially the Swiss Confederation, is a federal republic in Europe. It consists of 26 cantons, and the city of Bern is the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in western-Central Europe, and is bordered by Italy to the south, France to the west, Germany to the north, and Austria and Liechtenstein to the east. Switzerland is a country geographically divided between the Alps, the Swiss Plateau and the Jura, spanning an area of 41,285 km2. The establishment of the Old Swiss Confederacy dates to the medieval period, resulting from a series of military successes against Austria. Swiss independence from the Holy Roman Empire was formally recognized in the Peace of Westphalia in 1648. The country has a history of armed neutrality going back to the Reformation, it has not been in a state of war internationally since 1815, nevertheless, it pursues an active foreign policy and is frequently involved in peace-building processes around the world. In addition to being the birthplace of the Red Cross, Switzerland is home to international organisations. On the European level, it is a member of the European Free Trade Association. However, it participates in the Schengen Area and the European Single Market through bilateral treaties, spanning the intersection of Germanic and Romance Europe, Switzerland comprises four main linguistic and cultural regions, German, French, Italian and Romansh. Due to its diversity, Switzerland is known by a variety of native names, Schweiz, Suisse, Svizzera. On coins and stamps, Latin is used instead of the four living languages, Switzerland is one of the most developed countries in the world, with the highest nominal wealth per adult and the eighth-highest per capita gross domestic product according to the IMF. Zürich and Geneva have each been ranked among the top cities in the world in terms of quality of life, with the former ranked second globally, according to Mercer. The English name Switzerland is a compound containing Switzer, a term for the Swiss. The English adjective Swiss is a loan from French Suisse, also in use since the 16th century. The name Switzer is from the Alemannic Schwiizer, in origin an inhabitant of Schwyz and its associated territory, the Swiss began to adopt the name for themselves after the Swabian War of 1499, used alongside the term for Confederates, Eidgenossen, used since the 14th century. The data code for Switzerland, CH, is derived from Latin Confoederatio Helvetica. The toponym Schwyz itself was first attested in 972, as Old High German Suittes, ultimately related to swedan ‘to burn’
4.
New Orleans
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New Orleans is a major United States port and the largest city and metropolitan area in the state of Louisiana. The population of the city was 343,829 as of the 2010 U. S. Census, the New Orleans metropolitan area had a population of 1,167,764 in 2010 and was the 46th largest in the United States. The New Orleans–Metairie–Bogalusa Combined Statistical Area, a trading area, had a 2010 population of 1,452,502. The city is named after the Duke of Orleans, who reigned as Regent for Louis XV from 1715 to 1723, as it was established by French colonists and it is well known for its distinct French and Spanish Creole architecture, as well as its cross-cultural and multilingual heritage. New Orleans is also famous for its cuisine, music, and its celebrations and festivals, most notably Mardi Gras. The city is referred to as the most unique in the United States. New Orleans is located in southeastern Louisiana, straddling the Mississippi River, the city and Orleans Parish are coterminous. The city and parish are bounded by the parishes of St. Tammany to the north, St. Bernard to the east, Plaquemines to the south, and Jefferson to the south and west. Lake Pontchartrain, part of which is included in the city limits, lies to the north, before Hurricane Katrina, Orleans Parish was the most populous parish in Louisiana. As of 2015, it ranks third in population, trailing neighboring Jefferson Parish, La Nouvelle-Orléans was founded May 7,1718, by the French Mississippi Company, under the direction of Jean-Baptiste Le Moyne de Bienville, on land inhabited by the Chitimacha. It was named for Philippe II, Duke of Orléans, who was Regent of the Kingdom of France at the time and his title came from the French city of Orléans. The French colony was ceded to the Spanish Empire in the Treaty of Paris, during the American Revolutionary War, New Orleans was an important port for smuggling aid to the rebels, transporting military equipment and supplies up the Mississippi River. Bernardo de Gálvez y Madrid, Count of Gálvez successfully launched a campaign against the British from the city in 1779. New Orleans remained under Spanish control until 1803, when it reverted briefly to French oversight, nearly all of the surviving 18th-century architecture of the Vieux Carré dates from the Spanish period, the most notable exception being the Old Ursuline Convent. Napoleon sold Louisiana to the United States in the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, thereafter, the city grew rapidly with influxes of Americans, French, Creoles, and Africans. Later immigrants were Irish, Germans, and Italians, Major commodity crops of sugar and cotton were cultivated with slave labor on large plantations outside the city. The Haitian Revolution ended in 1804 and established the republic in the Western Hemisphere. It had occurred several years in what was then the French colony of Saint-Domingue
5.
New Iberia, Louisiana
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New Iberia is a small city in and the parish seat of Iberia Parish, Louisiana, United States. Located 30 miles southeast of Lafayette, in 1900,6,815 people lived in New Iberia, in 1910,7,499, and in 1940,13,747. The population was 32,623 at the 2000 census and 30,617 in 2010, New Iberia is the part of the Lafayette, Louisiana Metropolitan Statistical Area. New Iberia dates from mid-1779, when a group of some 500 Malagueños colonists led by Lt. Col, francisco Bouligny came up Bayou Teche and settled around Spanish Lake. In 1814, the government opened a post office, and it was officially known as New Iberia. The town was incorporated as Iberia in 1839, but the state legislature resolved the situation in 1847, during the American Civil War, New Iberia was occupied by Union forces under General Nathaniel P. Banks. The soldiers spent the winter of 1862–1863 at New Iberia and, winters of Louisiana Tech University in his The Civil War in Louisiana, found the weather each day more and more severe. The dreary days dragged by, and the men grumbled as they plowed through the freezing rain, Banks men from New Iberia foraged for supplies in the swamps near the city. In 1868, Iberia Parish was established, and New Iberia became the seat of parish government. At first, only rented space served for the courthouse, but by 1884 a new courthouse stood on a lot in downtown New Iberia. That courthouse served Iberia Parish until 1940, when the current courthouse was built along Iberia Street, New Iberia is located at 30°0′13″N 91°49′6″W and has an elevation of 20 feet. According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has an area of 10.6 square miles. New Iberia enjoys a climate with above average rainfall. Among the lakes is Lake Peigneur, which was formerly a 10-foot deep freshwater lake until a 1980 disaster involving oil drilling, the lake is now a 1, 300-foot deep salt water lake, having been refilled by the Gulf of Mexico via the Delcambre Canal. There is also Lake Tasse, better known as Spanish Lake and this region has many natural features of interest, such as Avery Island, famous for its Tabasco sauce factory, deposits of rock salt, and Jungle Gardens. As of the census of 2000, there were 32,623 people,11,756 households, the population density was 3,088.8 people per square mile. There were 12,880 housing units at a density of 1,219.5 per square mile. The racial makeup of the city was 56. 99% White,38. 42% African American,0. 21% Native American,2. 64% Asian,0. 02% Pacific Islander,0. 51% from other races, and 1. 20% from two or more races
6.
Hurricane Rita
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Hurricane Rita was the fourth-most intense Atlantic hurricane ever recorded and the most intense tropical cyclone ever observed in the Gulf of Mexico. Rita formed near The Bahamas from a wave on September 18 that originally developed off the coast of West Africa. It moved westward, and after passing through the Florida Straits, moving west-northwest, it rapidly intensified to reach peak winds of 180 mph, achieving Category 5 status on September 21st. Rapidly weakening over land, Rita degenerated into a large area over the lower Mississippi Valley by September 26th. Parishes in Southwest Louisiana and counties in Southeast Texas where Rita made landfall suffered from catastrophic-to-severe flooding, according to an October 25,2005 Disaster Center report,4,526 single-family dwellings were destroyed in Orange and Jefferson counties located in Southeast Texas. Major damage was sustained by 14,256 additional single-family dwellings, mobile homes and apartments also sustained significant damage or total destruction. In all, nine Texas counties and five Louisiana Parishes were declared disaster areas after the storm, electric service was disrupted in some areas of both Texas and Louisiana for several weeks. Texas reported the most deaths from the hurricane, where 113 deaths were reported,107 of which were associated with the evacuation of the Houston metropolitan area, moderate to severe damage was reported across the lower Mississippi Valley. Rainfall from the storm and its associated remnants extended from Louisiana to Michigan, rainfall peaked at 16.00 in in Central Louisiana. Several tornadoes were also associated with the hurricane and its subsequent remnants, throughout the path of Rita, damage totaled about $12 billion. As many as 120 deaths in four U. S. states were directly related to the hurricane, on September 7,2005, a tropical wave emerged off the west coast of Africa and moved westward into the Atlantic Ocean. Failing to produce organized, deep convection, the disturbance was not monitored by the National Hurricane Center for tropical cyclogenesis. Convection associated with the system increased briefly late on September 13 before dissipating shortly thereafter, at roughly the same time, a remnant surface trough had developed from a dissipating stationary front and began to drift westward north of the Lesser Antilles. Meanwhile, the wave slowly became better organized and was first noted in the NHCs Tropical Weather Outlooks on September 15 while northeast of Puerto Rico. The wave merged with the surface trough two days later, triggering an increase in activity and organization. At the time, the disturbance, classified as Tropical Depression Eighteen, was roughly 80 mi east of Grand Turk Island in the Turks, as a result, the tropical storm was named Rita. Once the upper-level low weakened, Ritas center of circulation reformed to the north, consequently, the tropical storm resumed its previous strengthening trend as it was steered westward across The Bahamas along the south periphery of a ridge. Upon entering the Straits of Florida on September 20, Rita strengthened into a Category 1 hurricane by 1200 UTC, six hours later, Rita intensified further into Category 2 before subsequently passing approximately 45 mi south of Key West, Florida
7.
Marriage
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The definition of marriage varies according to different cultures, but it is principally an institution in which interpersonal relationships, usually sexual, are acknowledged. In some cultures, marriage is recommended or considered to be compulsory before pursuing any sexual activity, when defined broadly, marriage is considered a cultural universal. Individuals may marry for several reasons, including legal, social, libidinal, emotional, financial, spiritual, whom they marry may be influenced by socially determined rules of incest, prescriptive marriage rules, parental choice and individual desire. In some areas of the world, arranged marriage, child marriage, polygamy, conversely, such practices may be outlawed and penalized in parts of the world out of concerns for womens rights and because of international law. These trends coincide with the human rights movement. Marriage can be recognized by a state, an organization, an authority, a tribal group. It is often viewed as a contract, Marriages can be performed in a secular civil ceremony or in a religious setting via a wedding ceremony. The act of marriage usually creates normative or legal obligations between the individuals involved, and any offspring they may produce, some cultures allow the dissolution of marriage through divorce or annulment. In some areas, child marriages and polygamy may occur in spite of laws against the practice. For example, the number of marriages in Europe decreased by 30% from 1975 to 2005 and these changes have occurred primarily in Western countries. The word marriage derives from Middle English mariage, which first appears in 1250–1300 CE and this in turn is derived from Old French, marier, and ultimately Latin, marītāre, meaning to provide with a husband or wife and marītāri meaning to get married. The adjective marīt-us -a, -um meaning matrimonial or nuptial could also be used in the form as a noun for husband. Anthropologists have proposed several competing definitions of marriage in an attempt to encompass the wide variety of marital practices observed across cultures, even within Western culture, definitions of marriage have careened from one extreme to another and everywhere in between. The anthropological handbook Notes and Queries defined marriage as a union between a man and a such that children born to the woman are the recognized legitimate offspring of both partners. In recognition of a practice by the Nuer people of Sudan allowing women to act as a husband in certain circumstances, Kathleen Gough suggested modifying this to a woman, none of these men had legal rights to the womans child. Economic anthropologist Duran Bell has criticized the definition on the basis that some societies do not require marriage for legitimacy. He argued that a definition of marriage is circular in societies where illegitimacy has no other legal or social implications for a child other than the mother being unmarried. In 1955 article in Man, Leach argued that no one definition of marriage applied to all cultures and he offered a list of ten rights associated with marriage, including sexual monopoly and rights with respect to children, with specific rights differing across cultures
8.
Natural gas
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It is formed when layers of decomposing plant and animal matter are exposed to intense heat and pressure under the surface of the Earth over millions of years. The energy that the plants originally obtained from the sun is stored in the form of bonds in the gas. Natural gas is a fuel used as a source of energy for heating, cooking. It is also used as fuel for vehicles and as a feedstock in the manufacture of plastics. Natural gas is found in underground rock formations or associated with other hydrocarbon reservoirs in coal beds. Petroleum is another resource and fossil fuel found in proximity to. Most natural gas was created over time by two mechanisms, biogenic and thermogenic, biogenic gas is created by methanogenic organisms in marshes, bogs, landfills, and shallow sediments. Deeper in the earth, at temperature and pressure, thermogenic gas is created from buried organic material. In petroleum production gas is burnt as flare gas. The World Bank estimates that over 150 cubic kilometers of gas are flared or vented annually. Before natural gas can be used as a fuel, most, Natural gas is often informally referred to simply as gas, especially when compared to other energy sources such as oil or coal. However, it is not to be confused with gasoline, especially in North America, Natural gas was used by the Chinese in about 500 BCE. They discovered a way to transport gas seeping from the ground in crude pipelines of bamboo to where it was used to salt water to extract the salt. The worlds first industrial extraction of gas started at Fredonia, New York. By 2009,66000 km³ had been used out of the total 850000 km³ of estimated remaining reserves of natural gas. An annual increase in usage of 2–3% could result in currently recoverable reserves lasting significantly less, unwanted natural gas was a disposal problem in the active oil fields. If there was not a market for natural gas near the wellhead it was expensive to pipe to the end user. In the 19th century and early 20th century, unwanted gas was burned off at oil fields
9.
Hurricane Katrina
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Hurricane Katrina was the costliest natural disaster and one of the five deadliest hurricanes in the history of the United States. The storm is ranked as the third most intense United States landfalling tropical cyclone. Overall, at least 1,245 people died in the hurricane and subsequent floods, total property damage was estimated at $108 billion, roughly four times the damage wrought by Hurricane Andrew in 1992 in the United States. Early the following day, the new depression intensified into Tropical Storm Katrina, the cyclone headed generally westward toward Florida and strengthened into a hurricane only two hours before making landfall at Hallandale Beach and Aventura on August 25. After very briefly weakening to a storm, Katrina emerged into the Gulf of Mexico on August 26. The storm caused severe destruction along the Gulf coast from central Florida to Texas, much of it due to the storm surge, severe property damage occurred in coastal areas, such as Mississippi beachfront towns, over 90 percent of these were flooded. Boats and casino barges rammed buildings, pushing cars and houses inland, over fifty breaches in New Orleanss hurricane surge protection were the cause of the majority of the death and destruction during Katrina on August 29,2005. Eventually 80% of the city and large tracts of neighboring parishes became flooded, according to a modeling exercise conducted by the U. S. Army Corps of Engineers, two-thirds of the deaths in Greater New Orleans were due to levee and floodwall failure. All of the studies concluded that the USACE, the designers and builders of the levee system as mandated by the Flood Control Act of 1965, is responsible. This is mainly due to a decision to use shorter steel sheet pilings in an effort to save money, exactly ten years after Katrina, J. Many other government officials were criticized for their responses, especially New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin, Louisiana Governor Kathleen Blanco, several agencies including the United States Coast Guard, National Hurricane Center, and National Weather Service were commended for their actions. They provided accurate hurricane weather tracking forecasts with sufficient lead time, Hurricane Katrina formed as Tropical Depression Twelve over the southeastern Bahamas on August 23,2005, as the result of an interaction of a tropical wave and the remains of Tropical Depression Ten. It strengthened into Tropical Storm Katrina on the morning of August 24, the tropical storm moved towards Florida, and became a hurricane only two hours before making landfall between Hallandale Beach and Aventura on the morning of August 25. The storm weakened over land, but it regained hurricane status about one hour after entering the Gulf of Mexico, on August 27, the storm reached Category 3 intensity on the Saffir-Simpson hurricane wind scale, becoming the third major hurricane of the season. An eyewall replacement cycle disrupted the intensification, but caused the storm to nearly double in size, the storm rapidly intensified after entering the Gulf, growing from a Category 3 hurricane to a Category 5 hurricane in just nine hours. This rapid growth was due to the movement over the unusually warm waters of the Loop Current. Katrina attained Category 5 status on the morning of August 28 and reached its peak strength at 1800 UTC that day, with sustained winds of 175 mph. However, this record was broken by Hurricane Rita
10.
Hurricane Ike
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In these places, Ike remains the costliest tropical cyclone on record. Several fluctuations in strength occurred before Ike made landfall on eastern Cuba on September 8, the hurricane weakened prior to continuing into the Gulf of Mexico, but increased its intensity by the time of its final landfall on Galveston, Texas on September 13. The remnants of Ike continued to track across the United States and into Canada, causing considerable damage inland, Ike was blamed for at least 195 deaths. Of these deaths,74 were in Haiti, which was trying to recover from the impact of three storms which had made landfall that same year. Seven people were killed in Cuba from Ike, in the United States,113 people were reported killed, directly or indirectly, and 16 were still missing as of August 2011. Due to its size, Ike caused devastation from the Louisiana coastline all the way to the Kenedy County region near Corpus Christi. Ike is now the third-costliest Atlantic hurricane of all time, only surpassed by Hurricane Katrina in 2005, the search-and-rescue operation after Ike is the largest search-and-rescue operation in Texas history. Ike was the major hurricane of the 2008 Atlantic hurricane season. The origins of Hurricane Ike can be traced back to a tropical wave first identified by the National Hurricane Center just within the western coast of Africa on August 28. The broad low-pressure continued to track westward and was considered to have sufficiently organized to be classified as a tropical depression at 06,00 UTC on September 1. By this time the cyclone had tracked 780 miles west of Cape Verde and these factors were also responsible for Ikes slow developmental trend that began after formation. Ikes gradual strengthening began to quicken early on September 3, with the strengthening of an intense rainband around the center of the storm, at roughly 15,00 UTC that day, microwave imaging indicated that a primordial eye was developing within the intensifying tropical storm. Tracking northwestward, the NHC upgraded Ike to hurricane status at 18,00 UTC based on satellite intensity estimates. During this time, Ike was centered 690 mi east-northeast of the Leeward Islands and was tracking west-northwestward as a result of a subtropical ridge to its northeast. After peaking in strength, a ridge of pressure to the storms west strengthened. Although wind shear abated and allowed for reintensification, Ike would fluctuate in strength over the few days. After passing near the Turks and Caicos Islands, Ike made its first landfall on Inagua in the Bahamas at 13,00 UTC on September 7 with winds of 125 mph. After passing over Inagua, the development of a double feature that usually denotes the beginning of an eyewall replacement cycle—slightly weakened Ike late on September 7
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