[HPFGU-OTChatter] Re: Disasters

[bamajenny12]

Jenny's comments embedded.....
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Judy 
  To: HPFGU-OTChatter at yahoogroups.com 
  Sent: Friday, September 02, 2005 2:40 PM
  Subject: [HPFGU-OTChatter] Re: Disasters

  Judy said:
  I am absolutely appalled at the situation in New Orleans. Who would have thought this could happen in America?  

  Preparedness in New Orleans was lacking in at least three areas. The first problem was that money for storm protections such as levees and barrier islands had been cut. [www.Salon.com has a good article on this.] 
  ===============
  Jenny Here: Yes, this funding has been cut, but that does
  not mean that the levees were neglected. The city of New
  Orleans is constantly inspecting/rebuilding/upgrading the
  levee system. I don't think that lack of funding was a
  major factor in this disaster. There were after all only
  three breaches in two levees through out the city.
  ===============
  Judy again:
  The second problem was that many thousands of residents and 
  tourists without cars were left with no way out of town.
  ===============
  Jenny again:
  Yes, when flights were cancelled on Saturday, tourists were left without a way out of town. But the city provided buses
  to the superdome for people who couldn't or wouldn't leave
  town. Several hotels were exempted from the evacuation order
  so that the tourists had a place to stay.
  ===============
  Judy:
  And the third is that the emergency workers (police, etc) were woefully unprepared to deal with this crisis; unable to keep order or provide essentials like drinking water.
  ===============
  Jenny:
  New Orleans had a flood plan in case the levees ever broke. Unfortunately, their plan did not factor in no communication, (not even 911 or police dispatch) no gas, and 80% of the city being under water, or being shot at while trying to rescue people. Even now, it is next to impossible to call a 504 area code land line or cellphone. I'm sure that when this is all over, the city will redo their flood plan. Even though it was not enough for the sheer magnatude of people, there was some aid available immediately after Katrina was over, but once the flooding started, that aid could not get where it was most needed.
  ===============
  Judy:
  The follow-up response to the disater was even worse. I heard an interview with the head of FEMA in which he said his agency hadn't known of the desperate conditions at the Superdome and Convention Center until Thursday.  How is that possible?  Doesn't anyone in his agency own a TV?
  ===============
  Jenny:
  Please understand that the convention center and superdome
  are two totally separate places. I say that just to point
  out that the convention center was never intended to be
  used as a shelter. Yes, the convention center was being
  mentioned on TV, but the reports I heard were not clear that
  they really meant two different places. My brother has lived
  in New Orleans since 1971, and even he thought the reporters
  were just confused and refering to the superdome as "the
  convention center". And it was quite a while after they
  started talking about it before they showed pictures so that
  we did realize they meant two different places.

  FEMA did know about the Superdome, but not the situation at
  the Convention center, mainly because of the lack of
  communication within the city of New Orleans. Everyone knew
  about the superdome because it was opened before the storm as a shelter, but not the convention center. Because the convention center is right on the river, there was a very good chance that it would flood during the hurricane. Actually it didn't, and people started going there, thinking that it would be a shelter. A CNN reporter talked to people there, all of whom said they went there based on a rumor.

  More than one of the reporters repeatedly made the comment they were in "a communications bubble" and that they had no idea what was going on outside their own little area. So, how was FEMA supposed to find out about the convention center? Whether or not some one had a TV, there was no power in New Orleans, no cable to pick up a CNN broadcast, and I really doubt if any one had time to watch TV. I know, Washington should watch TV, and tell New Orleans, but I doubt that the
  people in Washington were watching TV.
  ===============
  Judy:
  One of the main factors contributing to this disaster was the complete lack of evacuation transportation for people without cars. New Orleans is an urban area where many residents and
  tourists have no cars.  I travel a lot, so I have been paying
  attention to the experience of tourists in the city.  Many tourists were desperate to leave before the hurricane, but no transportation was available -- they tried cabs, rental cars, planes, even trying to arrange a hellicopter -- everything was full.  

  Sure, some people in New Orleans may have wanted to stay, but
  even if they had wanted to leave, it would have made little difference. Unless they had a car, there was no way out.  (I know there are cars left in the city, but many of these probably belong to two car families who left together in one car.  Unless one was willing to steal a car, and knew how to start it with no key, these left over cars were pretty useless.)  Why didn't the governor use school buses 
  to take people to inland, higher ground?  In most areas of the country, schools are equiped to serve as shelters. 

  As for having buses to take people to the "shelter" of the Superdome, the entire city was supposed to be evacuated.  What's the point of setting up "shelters" in an area you are trying to evacuate?
  ===============
  Jenny:
  Yes, there were tourists stuck in New Orleans, but the city
  had very little notice that the storm was headed directly to
  them. Landfall was Monday morning at about 6am. As late as
  Friday night, Katrina was still being predicted to be coming
  to me in Panama City, Florida. The complete evacuation of the
  entire city was NOT ordered for the hurricane. The complete
  evacuation was ordered after the flooding began. They have
  been evacuating people just from the dome for more than two
  days now, and I don't think they are finished. There was not
  enough time before the storm to evacuate people completely out of the city. That is why shelters were set up and people were taken there. My family evacuated on Sunday morning, but not because they were ordered to. They left because we have lived on the gulf coast for all our lives, and we had a very good idea what a CAT5 hurricane could do.
  ===============
  Judy:
  I hope this tragedy serves as a wake-up call for the U.S. We need to do better next time.
  ===============
  Jenny one last time:
  I definitely agree with that statement.

  First everyone needs to realize that New Orleans is having to
  deal with two major disastors. New Orleans actually survived the hurricane very well. There was some damage,and some
  flooding in areas that everyone knew would flood, but over
  all New Orleans came through that just great. The people in
  the French Quarter were celebrating because they hadn't
  flooded, and because there was very little damage. As of
  Monday afternoon, my family was planning on heading back to New Orleans on Tuesday morning.

  Then, the second disaster came: the breach in the levees. By
  the time that happened, people had actually started going
  back to their homes. Some of the people who were caught and
  had to be rescued could possibly have stayed elsewhere during
  the storm. The reason I say that the breach in the levee is a
  second disaster is because the people of New Orleans live
  with that every day. That is something that could happen
  during a bad thunderstorm, or after several days of rain.
  They didn't have to have a hurricane to cause it.

  Personally, I think that the responding agencies have done
  the best they could under the circumstances. No, I don't
  think it is the best that could have been done, but this is
  the type of situation that no one plans for because, until
  it happens, no one would ever expect that it would be this
  bad. Just like I'm sure that New Orleans will revamp their
  flood plan, I'm sure that FEMA and other agencies will be
  reviewing their response plans. Hopefully, this will help
  improve the response for future disasters.
  Jenny

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]