One of the communities in the path of Hurricane Charley as it came ashore August 13, 2004, was Punta Gorda, recording gusts up to 145 mph. This project utilizes aerial photos taken approximately 10 days after the storm battered the area, using a digital photography program. Focusing on the one-story residential structures (houses) of the Punta Gorda area, a damage assessment could be made of the area’s homes, and how they stood up to the storm. This study focused further on homes built after major changes to the local/state building codes went into effect (starting in 1996) after the devastation left in south Florida by Hurricane Andrew in 1992. After selecting approximately 20 damaged houses, damaged from wind loading only, an analysis of these houses (or types of houses) could then be undertaken complying with the most current building/wind codes used at the time of Charley’s landfall. Furthermore, by looking at the pictures, and using reports outlining the types of damage seen from the storm, the building/wind codes could then be checked for their effectiveness. After performing a wind loading analysis on houses similar to those seen in the selected pictures, and using the wind code provisions of ASCE 7-98, calculations show a substantial increase in local wind pressure to various zones of the roof. High pressure zones of the roof included the ridges of the gable and hipped style roofs, as well as the corners and the edges. More emphasis needs to be placed on the installation of the clay tiles (mandated by certain deed-restricted subdivisions of Punta Gorda). If the tiles are ripped off from the wind, then the roof sheathing becomes exposed to the environment, and if this becomes damaged, rain leaking down into the interior of the house would cause additional damage.

Thesis (M.A.) - Carleton University, 2007. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 133-143). Also available in electronic format on the Internet.

In La Migration des coeurs, Maryse Condé rewrites Emily Brontë's Wuthering Heights in a Caribbean context. Through its intertextual connection to Brontë's novel, Condé's text can be read in relation to Wuthering Heights according to the rhizomatic structure posited by Deleuze and Guattari, and further employed by Édouard Glissant in his Poétique de la Relation. The rhizome allows a comparison that resists a hierarchical comparison of the texts, and permits dialog and mutual influence between the two novels. Condé's critics, reinforcing this intertextual relation, have rarely considered La Migration des coeurs independently of Brontë's Wuthering Heights. However Windward Heights, Richard Philcox's English translation of Condé's novel, has not been previously considered worthy of a place in the rhizome. As a rewriting of Condé's own rewriting, Philcox's translation merits analysis in relation to the other two novels. This study will examine the nature of translation and rewriting in a postcolonial context. Primarily focusing on La Migration des coeurs, it will show how Condé uses the latent imperialist frame of Wuthering Heights to expose social inequalities in Guadeloupe, and how Philcox communicates this critique back to the English metropolis in Windward Heights.

The thesis is concerned with a prominent phenomenon of the mountain areas - the anemo- orographic systems which occur as a consequence of the collaboration of prevailing winds and of the large windward valleys, the summit flattened surfaces and the leeward slopes. Their presence has a vast influence of numerous physical-geographical realms, mainly due to the highly uneven spatial snow cover distribution within these systems. The focus of the thesis lies on the highest elevations of the Hrubý Jeseník Mts. which reach or exceed the alpine treeline. In this area, the anemo-orographic systems were already defined earlier but a thorough description and of their presence and activity has not been carried out so far, which is the main aim of the thesis. A detailed and spatially compact mapping and measurement of the flag or banner trees has been performed, as these, thanks to their deformed asymmetric shape, attest to the prevailing or mean wind direction as well as its velocity with a high accuracy. As a secondary and comparative data source the meteorological measurements from the summits of Praděd and Šerák Mounts and a modern and detailed wind model has been used. A verification measurement of snow cover depth at selected locations under presumed strong wind action was executed as well. The acquired...

Regimes of snow depth, soil temperature, soil matric potential and quasi-friction velocity in a windward site and a lee shelter were examined. The differences were analyzed from a biological perspective to .characterize each location in terms of site favorability to plant growth. The chronology of wind and precipitation events was investigated. Snow depth was measured with a system of stakes arranged around and in the interior of a rectangular plot encompassing both a windward site and a lee shelter. Soil temperature, soil matric potential and water potential were measured along a transect which originated in the windward site and terminated in the lee shelter. Soil temperature and water potential were measured by thermocouple psychrometer. Mattie potentials was determined by the pressure-plate method. The regimes of quasi-friction velocity at both ends of the transect were determined by the logarithmic profile method, invoking similarity theory. Wind speed and temperature were measured at two heights in each site. A computer program was used to search the wind and precipitation records and ·categorize and sun the precipitation events by wind direction. The lee shelter exhibited tendencies toward theoretical optima of site favorability. The horizontal distribution of snow maxima was found. to be a function of wind direction at the time of each precipitation event as well as the interaction of wind and the topographical features. Snow was observed to accumulate to a greater depth in the lee shelter than in the windward site. Mean soil temperature over the study period was 8.5° C in the lee shelter while the windward site was 8.0° C. Soil temperature in the lee shelter was never observed to go below 0° C under a snowpack. The range of soil matric potential in the lee shelter was found to be about 14 atm at a depth of 20 cm and about 17 atm at a depth of 50 cm over the summer season. In the windward site the range of soil matric potential was approximately 30 atm at a depth of 20 cm and about 21 atm at a the 50 cm depth over the same period. The lee shelter exhibited lower (less negative) matric potentials than the windward site. These results were not corroborated by the measurement of water potential by thermocouple psychrometers. In the layer from 1.5 to 4.1 m, the mean quasi-friction velocity in the lee shelter was 39 cm s-1, favoring snow deposition there over the windward site where the mean friction velocity was 21 cm s-l. In the 0 m to 1. 5 m layer, mean friction velocity in the windward site was found to be 55 cm s-1.while the lee shelter mean was 48 cm s-1. These results indicate a distinct seperation of flow downwind of the windward site where the lee shelter resides in the turbulent wake of the windward site.

The West India Royal Commission of 1897 advanced a number of recommendations intended to lift the West Indies out of their depressed condition and to shape their future economic development. This thesis examines the efforts made to implement those recommendations and the extent to which they influenced economic progress in the colonies of Barbadoes, British Guiana, The Windward and Leeward Islands. Particular attention is directed towards the recommendation that the labouring populations be encouraged to settle on the land as small proprietors. This proposal provided for the welfare of the largely Negro populations of the colonies, but it also threatened to upset the plantation dominated nature of the agriculture economy. The Royal Commission believed that peasant land ownership could be extended only through the introduction of government schemes of land settlement. The considerations which underlay the success or failure of such schemes and of peasant proproetorship in gneral constitute the central theme of the thesis. Other aspects of the economu which are examined affected planter and peasant alike. Freight connections, choice of crops, methods of cultivation, availability of markets, and access to expert advice were considerations which determined the success of both plantation and peasant proprietary. The Colonial Office role in the development of these colonies was limited and for the most part initiative rested with the colonies themselves. Questions of crop selection, or of the location for a settlement scheme, could only be decided by local experts. Furthermore, Joseph Chamberlain, the most influential Colonial Secretary of the period, as far as the West Indies were concerned, clearly believed in delegating responsibility to the local official. Nevertheless, when appropriate, the Colonial Office did play an active part. Its influence over shipping contracts was considerable, whilst the survival of the valuable Imperial Department of Agriculture, established in consequence of a recommendation of the Royal Commission, was entirely due to Colonial Office determination in the face of Treasury resistance.