How to Dispose of Dead Bodies
After a lengthy thunderstorm related delay in Dallas my plane finally left the tarmac arrived in New Orleans two hours later than planned. The rest of my team was already checked in to the guesthouse and on their way to the rendezvous point. The cab driver that picked me up had no idea how to get me where I was going. Thankfully a few calls later we were headed in the right direction. I made it on time to join the rest of the team for dinner uptown and and an adventure wandering through downtown.
Here's a question that comes from my Saturday morning tour of the Garden District. In NOLA, cemeteries look significantly different than they do in SLC. Based on your knowledge of human biology and geography of New Orleans, what can you determine about burial methods in this region. Why are the graves built this way and how do they function?The marble plaque on the grave to the left has been warped by the elements and undergone a process known as granulation. Earth science students, briefly describe this process, considering the properties of marble that make this possible.
Caterpillar #1
This afternoon our group heads out to our bunkhouse and field-site at the Pearl River Wildlife Management Area in Slidell, LA. Here's a sample of one type of caterpillar we'll likely see more of. This buck moth caterpillar was found outside the guesthouse we were staying in. Soon the job of identifying caterpillars will be yours. For a warm-up I'd like you to find (and record in your biology journal) this caterpillar's scientific name. Try using the caterpillars.org website. Note: search within Louisiana caterpillars.
posted by Erika @ 9:50 PM
6 Comments:
To answer your first question,
I personally think that the reason they build there graves above ground and bury the people in them is because, since new Orleans is such a marsh land, they don't want the graves moving under the ground. So if they were to have another flood they want the graves to stay where they were originally placed.
&& to answer your second questions,
The process called granulation is, when rock or stone starts to crystallize or turn into grains. In other words, the elements have worn down the layers of the rock or stone to the point that if they had writing on them, you wouldn't be able to tell. After a while, it just looks and feels smooth and untouched.
-Alli M.
These above the ground grave's are commonly none as cities of the dead and are made because early settlers had trouble keeping coffins in the ground due to water. They tried everything from tying them down to even putting stones in and on tope of them but nothing worked so they resorted to burying then above ground in an attempt to keep the body's from floating away.
Alex Spears
Earth Science class
The graves are above ground because if the area the cemetery is located floods th coffins will float away. That is why the coffins are in a cement housing grave and above ground. If they were below the ground they would flout up and rise again to see the light of day. "looks like these day you can't keep a good person down".
The reason they use marble for the graves is because of it durability to fire and erosion. Marble was used for many different things, infact they made the Lincoln memorial out of it. The mineral is used...i have nothing more to say : (
By: Patrick Strohm
Green Question: Because New Orleans is a swamp, any grave buried too shallow will reemerge when the floods or rains wash away the top soil. This causes a HORRIBLE odor. SO. New methods in New Orleans include digging around fifteen feet under and a crypt with two vaults, tightly sealed so no nasty smells can make their way to the surface. After a certain period of time a coffin can be dug up and burned so that there is space for more of the family down there.
Blue Question: To granulate is to form into granules or grain; make rough on the surface. I have no idea why granulation occurs in marble. Maybe it's because it's metamorphic and has lots of impurities. I have no idea.
granulation is the process of turning into grains/granules and it think that they use marble in there graves because it is weather resistant and doesn't absorb water so the granulation takes a long time
Alex Spears
New Orleans chooses to use an unusual method of burying their dead above ground. This may seem strange at first but there is a good reason for it. The water table in New Orleans is rather high and therefore flooding is not uncommon. The water saturated the earth rising to levels that reached above where coffins were buried. Because coffins often have air trapped inside them the water would push them and the decaying corpses inside to the surface. The first method used to try to prevent this from happening was to release the air in the coffins by drilling holes but although this stopped coffins from emerging it didn't allow bodies to decay properly because they were wet. This proved to be a heath hazzard.
By dictionary definition granulation is the process by which something is made rough and grainy. I am going to make an few educated guesses about wheat happens. Either the marble that the grave stone is made of is made up of tiny little granules of rock. So when the gravestones are weathered away by the elements the granules hold together and crystallize back into a solid mass. OR as water enters the marble, the separate granules are moved around warping the shape of the granite headstone would warp and develop a rough texture.
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