The New York Times has issued a correction to one of its reporters’ rendition of what happened in metro New Orleans on August 29, 2005.

This is important because a prominent news source like the New York Times has much influence over what America understands about New Orleans.

It seems that on August 13, reporter Timothy Egan employed some overly brief, thus inaccurate wording to describe what caused the 2005 flooding. Such shorthand can lead many to believe New Orleans was simply overwhelmed by a natural disaster rather than the truth – that metro New Orleanians were mainly victims of structural engineering failures.

So the next day, the New York Times editorial board received a massive batch of letters from Levees.org supporters pointing out the unethical and harmful use of “Katrina shorthand.”

And two days later, noted author John McQuaid, co-author of Path of Destruction joined in the rollicking discussion. “This is not a minor semantic point,” he correctly observed.

The NYTimes’ book review section’s editor issued a correction on September 6.

The correction was satisfactory. And it was significant.

And we hope this is the first of many such corrections to be issued by major news sources all across the country.

Because to say Katrina flooded New Orleans is like saying traffic wrecked the Minneapolis bridge.

Both revealed structural flaws. Both revealed blatant civil engineering incompetence.