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Katrina: What Went Wrong?
by Heliotrope
copyright 2005 all rights reserved
Hurricane Katrina slammed into New Orleans at 7am on
the morning of Sunday, August 29, 2005. Only a few days earlier, it
had hit part of the Florida coast, killing eleven people.
Within a very short time after hitting Florida, they,
being the Powers That Be, knew she was heading toward New Orleans,
and told residents to evacuate in as quickly and as orderly a manner
as possible. The vast majority of people heeded these warnings
and headed for safer ground, taking as many of their valuables with
them as they could. The remaining citizenry, for numerous
reasons, stayed behind in shelters like the vast Super Dome, in
various public shelters, and in their own homes. New Orleans
is, after all, a city which lies some six feet below sea level, the
water being held back only by levees designed to withstand a
category three hurricane. Pumps are in place to pump
accumulated water back where it came from. The city has
existed for the past few hundred years, and people have been holding
back the water since its founding.
The freeways resembled a great,
slow-moving parking lot that crawled away from New Orleans as people
moved to get away from impending destruction. Authorities even
opened the lanes that went in the opposite direction to move in the
direction of evacuation, to attempt to ease the citizens' escape.
Too bad that when Katrina blew in, she was a category
four storm, and that by only a very narrow margin. Shortly
before landfall, she had grown to a category five, but only by the
grace of the Gods, themselves, did she weaken ever so slightly.
Unfortunately, even a category four storm packs quite
the wallop. While initially, damage appeared relatively
manageable, things quickly mushroomed. Within twenty four
hours of the massive storm, the levees had begun to break down, and
the city rapidly flooded. Neighborhoods that had lost homes
quickly became rivers and then lakes. Some people were
fortunate enough to have higher ground to which to run. Days
later, rescuers are plucking them from the roofs of houses and other
buildings. Others, unfortunately, became victims of the rising
waters and drowned. New Orleans, an elder city of the Southern
United States, and a magnet for the world tourist community at Mardi
Gras and for various and sundry Anne Rice fans, became a sodden
shambles.
Katrina didn't limit herself to New Orleans. Oh
no, my children. She stretched her arms wide and wiped across
the states of Mississippi and Alabama, much as someone might use
their arm to wipe items off a heavily laden table, leaving
destruction in her wake. One Mississippi town was completely
destroyed by the vicious force of Hurricane Katrina as she blew into
and out of town.
A week later, they are suggesting the combined death
toll from Hurricane Katrina might well stretch into the thousands.
The sheer magnitude of such a loss of life is stunning, and one has
a near impossible ability to truly comprehend such destruction.
Thousands are left homeless, and the
military have moved in to try to bring some kind of order to what has become a
lawless nightmare. There is no drinkable water or edible food,
except what rescue workers have brought in with their effort to meet
the immediate needs of survivors. Decomposing bodies are
literally floating in amongst the debris of the city, and people
have described watching others dying.
Never oblivious to an opportunity for a little free
publicity, celebrities from musicians to actors have come by for
what can only be described as photo opportunities. At least
one actor is taking an active role in retrieval of bodies.
Fine, he may be doing this from a real concern for others, and the
respectful dispositions of the remains of those who did not survive.
But there are parts of me that wonder about the sensibility of
someone who is likely untrained in what is, for all intents and
purposes, hazardous waste cleanup. This is the time of year
commonly referred to in the Southern United States as "sauna season", so bodies have become
increasingly "ripe" over the past week or so in the water. One
celebrity took the opportunity to be photographed next to a
wheelchair containing a dead woman whose body had been loosely
covered, and a body wrapped in a white blanket that lay nearby.
While moving in its simplicity, the blatant photo opportunity taken
is stomach turning.
But the biggest hue and cry has been
about the apparent lack of preparedness for this horrific situation.
Government officials swear up and down that they had no idea
something of this magnitude could possibly occur. Others would
gainsay this and have indicated that over the past few years,
simulations have been done that would describe nearly exactly this
situation. One person referred to it as a "doomsday scenario".
Judging by Hollywood movies over the past few years, Hollywood
certainly has suggested situations such as these in their attempts
at entertainment. Why, at least, did they not upgrade the
levees to withstand a category four storm?
Of course, there is nothing entertaining about this
situation. Many people have become intensely emotional in
front of the camera. Understandably so, as they feel they are
being left in the lurch.
I had the honor of watching CNN newscaster Anderson
Cooper tear a government drone a new one. After she blabbered
on, thanking everyone from the President to FEMA to the military,
Cooper told her in no uncertain terms that those thanks were
meaningless to the thousands of people left homeless, hot, hungry
and thirsty by Hurricane Katrina. With barely controlled
anger, he told this woman that the people need help. That
there was little evidence of help in sight. That bodies were
everywhere, in particular mentioning the body of a woman that had
been lying in the street so long that "rats were eating it".
She still kept spouting the governmental crap, and Cooper finally
gave up and thanked her for appearing on CNN.
Over the week, there have been reports
of people being evacuated and being told their pets aren't allowed
to come with them. Some people have gone so far as to have
their pets put to sleep, rather than face an uncertain future.
There was the story of a little boy, screaming for his dog
"Snowball", that was taken away by the authorities as he was loaded
onto an evacuation vehicle. The boy became so overwrought that
he began to vomit. Animal lovers have come together to help
foster these animals and try to reunite them with their families.
Others have come together to gather
funds and resources to help those displaced by Hurricane Katrina.
The outpouring of help and sympathy has been heartwarming.
People have been giving huge amounts of money to the Red Cross
(which, by the way, lists lower overhead costs than the United Way,
for example), animal welfare groups, church groups, the Society for
Creative Anachronism has developed a donation network that will
transport needed items to the Southern United States, and more.
In the face of disaster, most Americans find a way to pull even a
dollar or two from their pockets to help, and every dollar or two
helps, believe me.
But the governmental response to this
great wash of giving is sickening. Over a thousand doctors,
poised to descend upon these areas to give much needed help are
being held back by governmental red tape and the refusal of some of
these so-called authorities to allow them to enter damaged areas.
Trent Lott of Mississippi is decrying FEMA's delayed okay of the release of
thousands of trailers that could temporarily house some of the
people in his state who currently have no place to live.
Apparently FEMA is wanting to have some contracts signed before they
will release the 20,000 trailers for public use. The
Red Cross is prevented from entering places like New Orleans to help
out, as the government would rather people moved out of the city,
rather than get help as quickly as possible.
One can only hope that the people will
remember who actually did something during this awful time.
Hopefully they will remember who actually did something while they
are filling out their ballots. Hopefully they will remember
who gave lip service and babbled meaningless thanks and empty words
while others fought and argued to be allowed to help those in need.
Hopefully they will remember the people who tried to use this
disaster as an opportunity to slip other, very important, things by
the American people while their attention was diverted.
There has been a call for FEMA and the
Department of Homeland Security to become separate entities, and
perhaps that would ease the kinds of situations cited above which
have brought these people to the point of violence. Something
like this needs our attention, as we need to let our purported state
representatives know our will, and that if they will not heed it,
we, the voters, will respond appropriately.
Everyone is to blame with this.
Federal, State and Local authorities dropped the ball. It
would be nice to have just one group to point the finger at
(whichever finger you might choose to point), but we don't have that
luxury. A memo recently released indicates that FEMA head
Brown waited five hours after Katrina struck to request permission
from the President to send workers, and then gave workers a deadline
of two days to arrive!
Unfortunately, the human animal has a
short attention span. We respond only to the gratification of
our immediate needs, and then, when something shiny glints in the
sunlight, we immediately move in that new direction to check out the
new pretty.
Don't let that happen this time.
Demand that there be a thorough investigation into the response to
Hurricane Katrina. Demand that the investigation come from
outside the government, to avoid a whitewash. Demand
governmental accountability. And if the answers aren't what
they should be, kick them out of office at the earliest opportunity! |
Click the picture above for a larger
map showing hurricane landfall locations from 1950 to 2004, to get
an idea of the history of the weather history of this part of the
country. The picture will open into a new window.
FEMA Is Crazy
Katrina Victims: Where's
FEMA?
Top FEMA officials have scant
experience in disaster management
Weakening of FEMA only increases
our vulnerability
FEMA director Brown singled out
by critics of federal response
Cut the Red Tape, Lott Says
Criticizes FEMA for holding up 20,000
trailers 'sitting in Atlanta'
New Orleans police to be pulled
off streets
96 Britons missing in wake of
Katrina
Bush plans investigation into
hurricane response |
