Bour-...blub-blub...-bon Street

[Rick Denney]

I think there will be a lot of fallout over the lack of preparation for this. When 20% of the population is left behind to either die (in the case of the elderly and infirm) or wreak mayhem (in the case of looters) or to serve as victims (the "let's tough it out" people), the situation deserves a hard look.

I'm trying to think of what it would take to get those 100,000 people to leave before the storm hit. How many buses would that require (assuming they don't have cars)? How long would it take to gather all those buses (and their drivers)? What force would be required to get people onto those buses who didn't want to go? How would you notify all 100,000, many of whom are apparently just not listening? Where would they be taken? What would be the fallout if they did all that and then the storm turned sharply right and missed the city altogether, only to lay Mobile or Pensacola waste, where such precautions weren't taken because all the resources were used up in New Orleans?

I don't see any credible way to plan for this, and particularly because the people for whom the plan is created have no interest in carrying it out. Sometimes you just have to leave people to their fate.

Of course, that doesn't apply to the infirm and those in hospitals, etc. But that's why those should get first priority in rescue services.

Some natural disasters just can't be planned for without an unacceptably large and expensive response infrastructure. What happens if Mount Rainier erupts, or worse, explodes? What happens if a major fault lets go in California for The Big One? What happens if the New Madrid fault along the Mississippi lets go for an even bigger one? Even if you knew when it would occur with two days warning, two days just ain't enough. Remember that, like Camille, Katrina strengthened explosively on Saturday, and made landfall on Monday morning. On Friday, it was just another hurricane, like the dozen or so that potentially threaten the people on the Atlantic and Gulf coasts every year.

When I was in the public sector, I carried an EOC pass and had disaster responsibilities. I listened to many a lecture by a FEMA moron talking about silliness. But, no amount of intelligence could plan for something like this effectively--there was too much uncertainty and too little time once the big questions were answered.

A big step forward would be for the people to work with their rescuers, as most are, rather than against them. It would also help if they made at least a few preparations in response to the warnings that came their way on Sunday, such as storing water and food where they could be reached in high water and so on. I do that routinely where I live when a big snowstorm is coming.

Rick "who thinks it takes two days for a command from the director to reach the people on the ground, even when given priority, and not being a lawyer wouldn't make that go faster" Denney

[Chuck(G)]

Back in July, Naugin said that the city lacked sufficient resources to evacuate everyone, essentially saying that the poor would have to fend for themselves. If you need a citation, I can find one for you.

Then our Chief Executive says this (from BBC World Service):

"I don't think anybody anticipated the breach of the levees. They did appreciate a serious storm but these levees got breached and as a result much of New Orleans is flooded and now we're having to deal with it and will," he said.

Now, that's pure horsepucky. Here's what the AP had to say in 2002:

http://www.waterconserve.info/articles/ ... nkid=14106

I can cite other documents, including an insurance industry report from 2000 that basically says the same thing.

Isn't it strange that, in the South, with all of its military bases, insufficient resources couldn't be mobilized for an evacuation? And that, after making excuses beforehand, FEMA has suddently turned up about 380 buses for transporting the poor wretches caught in the Superdome?

Well, cholera hasn't broken out--yet, but it's probably just a matter of time. The arson fires haven't gotten really going--yet.

The hurricane season's only half over. Now, if this was an Arabian Horse national disaster, I'd feel better...

[ThomasDodd]

that's pure horsepucky. Here's what the AP had to say in 2002:
I can cite other documents, including an insurance industry report from 2000 that basically says the same thing.

It's similar to past problem. No one listens, and few really belive the worst can happen untill it does.

Like the attacks in NYC and DC in 2001, when no one believed such an attack was likely or possible. Any real attempt at prevention was lambasted and those in dupport ridiculed.

Look at the Miss. River levees. The are the result of massive flood in the 30's. They've know the levees in NO wouldn't stand up to a Cat4+ but wouldn't/couldn't do much.

Now something mignt change, but I'd never live there, or within 200 miles of the gulf/atlantic coast. I'm not going near volcanos or fault lines either.

[Joe Baker]

It's similar to past problem. No one listens, and few really belive the worst can happen untill it does.

... partly because there are SO MANY prophets of doom, all predicting catastrophe if their pet project isn't funded. 99% of them ARE "horse-pucky". Clearly, this one was not; but my outrage at lack of preparation is somewhat moderated by the recognition that it's difficult to know just which doom-sayers are really telling the truth and which are trumping up data to support their slab o' pork.

HOWEVER, there's just NO excuse for the fact that food and (especially) water hasn't been airlifted in to these people stuck on the interstate overpasses. I may be missing something, but I don't understand why it would take three+ days to get this moving.

To Henry: for my part, I'm NOT sanctioning 'sideliners' getting into the action. I'm talking about duly authorized, trained, experienced law-enforcement personnel and MAYBE National Guard, not just any good ol' boy with a gun. So we may not be so very far apart, after all.
__________________________________
Joe Baker, who is prepared to roll heads of either (or neither) political party if appropriate.

[ThomasDodd]

Joe Baker, who is prepared to roll heads of either (or neither) political party if appropriate.

Putting someone in charge of FEMA with no experience in disaster management does seem to be a bad decision, though, don't you think?

Are you speaking of the national or regional directors?

At the top, Brown is not new, having been with FEMA for a few year, including last year and it's hurricanes. http://www.fema.gov/about/bios/brown.shtm

Still, these guys are like CEOs. Just management. Most CEOs have no experience in the field. How many automotive CEOs ever worked in R&D or on the assembly line? Same with most other large companies (blue chips in the stock market).

[Rick Denney]

...Then our Chief Executive says this (from BBC World Service):

"I don't think anybody anticipated the breach of the levees. They did appreciate a serious storm but these levees got breached and as a result much of New Orleans is flooded and now we're having to deal with it and will," he said.

...

Isn't it strange that, in the South, with all of its military bases, insufficient resources couldn't be mobilized for an evacuation? And that, after making excuses beforehand, FEMA has suddently turned up about 380 buses for transporting the poor wretches caught in the Superdome?

I heard that interview with Diane Sawyer that the BBC quoted, and it also caught my attention. I think he meant that nobody expected the levees to break once the storm had passed with no apparent severe damage. In other words, they were not mobilizing the major relief effort on Monday when the storm had passed and everything seemed okay. On Sunday, they were consumed by trying to get the evacuation executed. It was not until late Monday or Tuesday morning that the levees were breached and the city was going to flood.

As far as the 380 buses are concerned, you still haven't answered my questions. They didn't "suddenly" produce them. They started working on those buses Monday night (when the levees broke), and the first batch of them didn't arrive until Wednesday mid-day. And that was on a weekday. Do you think ANYBODY could have done that between Saturday when the storm strengthened suddenly and Sunday when the evacuation had to occur? And those 380 buses can carry about 15,000 people at capacity, which means with none of them carrying more than a bag of luggage. There is no way in the world you'd have gotten even that many onto those buses. Those people who went to the Superdome on Sunday fully expected to return to their homes on Monday. Whether or not that expectation was realistic, that was the call they made, and they had access to the same information you and I did.

By the way, it would take 2500 buses to move the entire 100,000 who stayed behind. And the buses would have just added to the total congestion on the departing highways. I doubt there is an agency at any level of government that has the defensible legal authority to comandeer that many buses from that many sources before the disaster. And if one of those buses crashed and killed a few folks, and the evacuation proved unnecessary (as it did for a storm last year), the legal fallout would be profound.

The disaster-movie notion of a 25-foot storm surge overtopping the Pontchartrain levee would not have resulted in a two-day filling of the lower parts of the city. It would have resulted in an immediate and catastrophic flood. That was the warning issued to the public on Sunday, yet still 80,000 of those 100,000 stayed in their homes. Some didn't get the message, some could not respond, and others refused to respond. How do you solve that problem even if you have the buses?

Nobody who lives in a hurricane zone should minimize the risk of floodiing. But even so, it's still a relatively rare event. There have only been three landfalls of category five hurricanes in the U.S. since records were being kept, including Camille, Andrew, and the Labor Day Storm of 1935. The highly destructive category 4 storms are pretty rare, too, and many of them land in lightly populated areas and don't do as much damage. Carla was a category 4 storm that landed in Texas in 1961, but did less damage than Allison, a mere tropical storm that flooded my parents' home, and Alicia, a marginal category 3 storm, both of which hit Houston squarely. What would you do, clear the entire coast?

But there is really no safe place from natural disaster, and it's nearly impossible to anticipate them all and spend what it would take to eliminate the risk of tragic loss of life. If we see an 8.something earthquake on the New Madrid fault (which is quite likely--it's happened before), the bridges over the Mississippi from Memphis to St. Louis will probably all be at risk, and there will be potentially severe destruction. Here in northern Virginia, we are as vulnerable to destruction by tornado from a cyclonic storm as anyone (as we found last year when Ivan dropped a tornado that clear some of the woods 1000 feet west of our house). Heck, over a third of Camille's fatalities were in Virginia, the result of torrential rains and landslides.

When people suffer tragedy they don't deserve, it's easy to throw blame around. But any politician who tried to spend what it would take to anticipate Lake Pontchartrain spilling into the city would have to divert money away from other programs, and the supporters of those programs would have drummed them out of office. Forcing people to move away from risky areas would require making judgements that seem to me impossible to make. People discount risk all the time, and occasionally that decision proves folly, but only in hindsight.

Now, keeping the levees properly maintained, which I'm sure was not done, is another matter.

Rick "thinking that disaster planning is a risk management exercise, not risk elimination, which is impossible" Denney

[ThomasDodd]

And if one of those buses crashed and killed a few folks, and the evacuation proved unnecessary (as it did for a storm last year), the legal fallout would be profound.

Come on Rick, can we eat our cake after we get it?

Nobody who lives in a hurricane zone should minimize the risk of floodiing. But even so, it's still a relatively rare event. ... What would you do, clear the entire coast?

My in-laws went by that rule. 1/4 of the distance east to west on the souther MS border with LA. We call them Sunday to come north. The response was no. It would turn. Wednesday morning we heard from them. In tears, "It was horriible!" Hard not to laugh, given the warning and thier attitude Sunday.

Some people just won't go. You'd have to drag them kicking and screaming to safety.
To do this in all the small towns would take weeks. There are still people that live 30+ minutes from their nearest neighbor.

Rick "thinking that disaster planning is a risk management exercise, not risk elimination, which is impossible" Denney

Where's your humanity Rick. You know you cannot talk about risk management and living people at the same time. At least not around certain groups.

[Chuck(G)]

Now, keeping the levees properly maintained, which I'm sure was not done, is another matter.

Same bunch of rascals, as far as I can see:

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp ... 1001051313

Out where I live, forest wildfires are the big natural disaster. Up until about 5 years ago, the Forest Service would sponsor readiness drills, where all of the surrounding fire districts, and the USFS would simulate a wildfire (smoking barrels) and respond to it. Helicopters and plaines, more fire equipment than you could imagine. My neighborhood was a favorite place for these things, as it represents a forested area with some residences and farms--a very tricky situtaion.

But it all stopped suddenly. When I asked a USFS friend what happened, he replied that funding had been cut and the Service was told to rely on computer simulations.

Now, I'm not an expert in the field, but it would seem to this poor benighted soul that the better part of Homeland Security would be disaster preparedness.

Apparently not. Gimme them tax cuts!

[ThomasDodd]

Apparently not. Gimme them tax cuts!

The tax cut aren't the problem though.
1) revenue has go up with the lower tax rates.
2) spending has increased faster.

#2 is the problem. Especially where the money goes. Paying bueracrats and funding pork. Multiple offices with overlapping projects. Incerased funding of failed programs instead of shutting them down and trying something different.

The government could bring in $200 billion above current spending (ie, surplus) and it would all be spent twice.

I'll leave it to the reader to decide which projects are the problem. Would want to get political.
Just remember politics and politicians are the problem.

[Joe Baker]

Out where I live, forest wildfires are the big natural disaster. Up until about 5 years ago, the Forest Service would sponsor readiness drills,... But it all stopped suddenly. When I asked a USFS friend what happened, he replied that funding had been cut and the Service was told to rely on computer simulations.

Now, I'm not an expert in the field, but it would seem to this poor benighted soul that the better part of Homeland Security would be disaster preparedness.

Apparently not. Gimme them tax cuts!

Not the problem here. They spent $250,000 last year simulating (not computer-simulating) this EXACT scenario, and still muffed it.
____________________________________
Joe Baker, who observes that even hindsight isn't always 20/20.

[Paul S]

.......Now something might change, but I'd never live there, or within 200 miles of the gulf/atlantic coast. I'm not going near volcanos or fault lines either.

As magnificently terrible as this whole situation is, there was actually a quite sizeable evacuation and correct expectations of what problems would be faced beforehand yet response has been horrid.

If I were located in a major population center in California I would now fully realize that there will be no hope at all if/when the expected major quake occurs without prior warning.

This is a thought that really scares me and I am in the midwest...

[Chuck(G)]

For those of you in the area, here's another way to help out:

http://www.hurricanehousing.org/

[Daryl Fletcher]

[Chuck(G)]

If I were located in a major population center in California I would now fully realize that there will be no hope at all if/when the expected major quake occurs without prior warning.

I wasn't that far from the epicenter when the Loma Prieta quake hit in '89. California earthquakes can do a lot of damage, but the aftermath isn't nearly as bad as what Katrina's leaving behind.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loma_Prieta_earthquake

[MartyNeilan]

Why doesn't Bush & Co. just put Rudy Guiliani in charge? They need a no-nonsense guy who has courage, won't back down, and can make decisions in a split second. After 9/11 he was like the Godfather - hundreds lined up to ask him questions about anything and everythig going on in the city, and he took care of business while our President was hiding under his bed on Airforce One. Rudy WAS America's leader that day and the next. Politicians in Lake Nawlins keep complaining there are "too many frickin cooks" without taking charge themselves and getting the job done. Oh, well at least their governor cried on TV, that makes it all better.

[Chuck(G)]

Chuck and Henry,

1/ I love you guys.

2/ I'm glad you live far away.

The feeling's mutual, Joe.

[ThomasDodd]

I'm more than a little disappointed in the lack of national leadership in all of this.

What national leadership?!? If this were another country we'd be there in full force. They need buses to get people out but they are UNABLE to obtain a bus from neighboring states? You all know that we would have a C5 packed with buses if someone else needed them. I think the looters are an embarrassment to the city, but our govt is embarrassingus all.

I do hope you're never in a position to run such an effort.

Lets see. The airport was closed, so you couldn't land the planes. The roads are flooded, so you cannot drive them anywhere. Oh and there's not much usable fuel for the busses either.
Yeah, good idea. Load up a few C5s with busses and fly to N.O.

Maybe some of you need to go look at previous relief efforts. The day of, or the next, we pledged lot's of help. But it took days to get stuff moving, and even long to distrubite supplies once there arrived.

[ThomasDodd]

Why doesn't Bush & Co. just put Rudy Guiliani in charge? ... while our President was hiding under his bed on Airforce One.

I see Michael Moore is sill around. I hope Marty if OK. Cooks can be dangerous.

[Daryl Fletcher]

[ThomasDodd]

I never said to ship buses to NO via C5s, simply that if someone else needed them the US would do so. I understand the logistics of things but there is MORE the govt can be doing right now.

Such as?
Then again, should the federal government be expected to do anything, let alone everything? The only constitutional action I can see the Feds doing involves the oil/gas pipelines needed for national security. What in the constitution gives the Feds the power to take my taxes or yours to provide food, water, transportation, or housing to anyone?

Most of the relief will, and should, come form NGOs like the Red Cross. The shelters and aid for charitable work buy private citizens and companies (Wal-Mart, Target, Budwieser...) States, may or may not have constituutional authority (depens on the state) to do much in their own state, or any other.

One things that isn't being reported on is that Bush cut the levee funding by 80% in 2003 while New Orleans was REPAIRING and UPGRADING the system.

No, Congress did that. Bush could propose it, and possibly veto it, but Congress controls the spending. Perhaps Lousiana/N.O. should maintain their levees?