The flooding of the lower 9th ward of Louisiana and the neighboring St. Bernard Parish was a man made disaster caused by shoddy oversight of the MR-GO navigational channel by the US Army Corps of Engineers, according to a judge in Louisiana. The judge has awarded plaintiffs $720,000 in a decision released late Wednesday night. The full text of the decision can be read here.

The current case will require the army to pay damages to three families and a business and could open the door to other suits from upwards of 100,000 residents who were affected by the flooding. One plaintiff was denied damages in the case because the judge ruled that the flooding of eastern New Orleans was not caused by the way the army handled the MR-GO channel, shutting the door on suits filed by residents in the eastern half of the city.