A NASA research team is spending a few days in Franklin conducting research on how severe weather impacts daily life.
While in Franklin the NASA research team met with leaders in business and industry, tourism and economic development and Franklin Government.
Rachel Moore Best, the founder of The Human Factor, a company contracted under NASA said their research in Franklin helps to understand the effects of extreme weather changes and its impact on communities.
“So maybe it’s affecting their jobs, maybe it’s affecting their homes or other systems that they have to interact with on a day to day,” Moore Best said.
“And what that can do is it can point us towards solutions that potentially can help communities like Franklin across the United States to adapt to the changes that are happening in our country.”
Nasa Aimes Research Scientist Jon Rask said NASA is interested in understanding the problems and opportunities in both urban and rural environments.
“Franklin, because of its location in the earth is impacted by weather, floods, droughts,” Rask said.
“We’ve identified this area as a place where NASA should do research. While we know those things are happening, we don’t fully appreciate or understand how they’re affecting the local community.”
Diane Wiltz is the owner of Lamp Post Reception Hall, Lamp Light Coffee House and Bistro and Lamp Station Ice Cream Shoppe. She said abnormal weather conditions have a major impact on his traffic.
“Of course, because we’re southerners we’re not used to this kind of freezing weather so our clientele, our patrons don’t come out as much when the weather is cold as it is right now,” Wiltz said.
"And the weather it’s too cold, it’s too hot, we suffer when we have torrential rain.”
Franklin Mayor Eugene Foulard said the city has had to find ways to deal with extreme weather impacting their infrastructure.
“We had an extreme drought that hit us from June until about October which led to saltwater intrusion,” Foulcard said.
“We had some unprecedented things from the drought broken waterlines that had to be repaired, so all of that affects your economy because if we don’t have water for our businesses they can’t open.”
