Thanks for your thoughtful approach KT. I have been following all aspects of the stories closely, (don't look at today's New York Times if you don't want to know about the rebuilding contracts), and like you, I find it difficult to approach the disaster on this forum dedicated to the environment. That's all for now. Perhaps in a few more days I can add more.

I would think that the marine life in the Gulf of Mexico is already suffering from nutrient overload the Mississippi River provides. Will the spike of pollutants released by hurricane Katrina cause significant and permanent damage to the marine ecosystem?

Residents of New Orleans stayed in town either because they could not afford to leave, or because they thought they could ride out the storm. I am guessing that FEMA was slow to move the National Guard to the area, because they were hoping that the storm would veer away from New Orleans, and the Guard would not be needed. In hindsight, FEMA should have begun to move National Guard troops to the area 48 hours before the storm arrived.

I am conflicted on the issue of rebuilding in the flood plain. It seems like madness to put housing in the low- lying areas, and yet, I know that there will be overwhelming political pressure to do exactly that.

FEMA was slow because the agency's planning and response authority was transferred to Homeland Security which had eyes only for terrorism and funds only for military response not emergency medical/rescue. Like other federal agencies (EPA, FDA, HHS, NPS) FEMA has been hollowed out as career experts left in disgust or were driven out to be replaced by worthless party hacks like Brown.

There's not just political pressure to rebuild but now an infusion of tax money coupled with the recent Supreme Court Ruling permiting the taking of land by Gov't for the "public good". Keep watching to see where our money goes and how the notion of public good evolves.

See my post on Red Tide for info on how the Gulf is doing in my neck of the woods.

Linked below, an article on the disintegration of FEMA from last year - from a local paper....

excerpt:

**...Under mitigation plans, houses in floodplains are moved or raised above the flood line, buildings are designed to withstand hurricane winds and earthquakes, and communities are relocated away from likely wildfire zones. According to FEMA estimates, every dollar spent on mitigation saves roughly two dollars in disaster recovery costs.

But since 2001, crucial federal mitigation programs have had their budgets slashed. FEMA's Project Impact, a model mitigation program created by the Clinton admini-stration, has been canceled outright. Federal funding of post-disaster mitigation efforts designed to protect people and property from the next disaster has been cut in half, and now communities across the country must compete for pre-disaster mitigation dollars. That means states must wrangle with each other for funding they once got automatically....**

& here's a Washington Post Article
on the latest attempt to use the disaster to further privatise a gov't agency that actually does a good job of providing warnings....

excerpt:

**...S_______m, long at odds with the federal agency, is pushing a bill that would require it to surrender some of its duties to private businesses, some of them located in his state. The National Weather Service Employees Organization said in a statement: "We did our job well and everyone knows it. By falsely claiming that we got it wrong, R__k S_____m is continuing his misguided crusade against the National Weather Service."**

Here is a link that might be useful: Disaster Waiting....

Perhaps if NOAA would start naming hurricanes Abdul, Bashshar, Osama, etc, we'd get better results?

Here is a link that might be useful: Terrorist Storms...

Carolb, long time no hear; still having access difficulties you-know-where?

I'm with KT in suspecting that many Federal agencies under the Executive Branch are destined to be gutted and turned into political hack heavens, much like happened during and right after the Civil War. Truly institutional graft and corruption. That said, I am sure there are worthy political appointees during credible work in such agencies.

Eric, I don't think anyone really knows how marine life will be affected or for how long since no testing of the contaminated water to determine what the pollutants are has been done.

I read this article yesterday about the lack of input from the EPA (because they were not included in the effort) with a strong opinions by EPA toxic waste specialist Hugh Kaufman. I agree with Kaufman when he says the money went to purchasing guns & cowboys.

Here is a link that might be useful: independent article

Althea, I can't help but be reminded of NYC after 911 and how EPA withheld information about the harmful particles in the air that posed such a health risk to inhabitants, first responders, and the demolition crews. In this case, I confess I can't tell whether the lack of detailed and systematic water contaminant information from New Orleans is by design or simply more evidence of incompetence. In all fairness, I can't imagine how you'd even begin to cleanup such an extensive toxic spill without contaminating nearby lakes and rivers, although you have to start by conducting sample testing and EPA should presumably be the lead agency.

Good point about the EPA's response in NY KT. Even if they would have been active in the immediate clean-up, their reports should now be called to question considering their recent history. I vote for more evidence of incompetence as the cause of excluding the EPA.

Hi again - & yes Mr. M, still no go on the 'other' forum = (

I remind myself that it's not the ENTIRE EPA - just the 1s @ the top...

& the phrase 'plausible deniability' is constantly popping into my mind these days.

Or should that be 'willful ignorance'?

Hmm interesting - on AAR this a.m....

**This morning we'll be joined by Hugh Kaufman, Senior Policy Analyst at the EPA's Office of Solid Wastes & Emergency Response. He'll talk with us about why he believes the government is choosing to cover up the reality that the water in NOLA could be contaminated for another 10 years.** LINK

Listening to archived show right now & this guy is sharp.

Interview is 26 minutes (approx. 1/4) into the show archive....

Here is a link that might be useful: Archive

Carolb, we will behave ourselves here so that you won't be offended by us.

Now Marshall, what makes you think I'd be offended by anybody here?

= )

That reminds me...Where's For ester?

Oh, Wayne, that was kind of a low blow, coming from you.

From my understanding, FEMA does not ordinarily go in prior to a disaster, and being that the day of Katrina, it initially appeared that New Orleans was going to get lucky and have little damage, I'm not surprised at the response time. They did get involved in the Katrina disaster faster than they did after Andrew a couple of years back. The city of NO had five days prior warning to institute their emergency preparedness plan, and there were some attempts to get locals evacuated, but overall, the city and state failed miserably, so it's not just the feds that should be getting the blame. As for the water contamination, DH grew up in that region, and has grim predictions for the gulf seafood industry due to the high pollution levels.
Mrs H

Mrs. H,

You're right about the remark.....not so funny.

I agree with a lot of your post about New Orleans. I would say that the disaster was somewhat unprecedented in that a whole large city needed to evacuate and couldn't/wouldn't do it. Looking back it is easy to see that NO was a disaster waiting to happen.

The Dutch have been checking out their dikes as much land is below sea level there. They spent heavily many years ago to prevent a flood disaster....NO built a Superdome instead. Indianapolis is doing the same thing right now....about 800 million for their Superdome. That amount could do a lot of improvments in infrastructure but sports are more glamorous.

This link is to an article in todays N.O. Times-Picyaune,"Flood waters still propose Health threat, EPA says". It reports what testing has been done with the results, and criticism of the testing.

Here is a link that might be useful: nola

I agree that all sectors of Gov't should re-examine their plans and performance, but FEMA can be faulted because they are supposed to be the lead agency with professionals to advise local Gov't. We've given them major tax dollars that could have gone to local needs for this very purpose. Also for their mind-blowingly slow bureacracy after the response including (and this is not a comprehensive list):

- Homeland Security Chief Cheroff didn't even know his own plans and waited 36 hours to give Brown the go-ahead to mobilize federal assistance to NO,
- simply being less informed about where people were suffering from lack of food and water than the average TV viewer,
- being surprised that levees built for a class 3 storm would fail in a class 4 hurricane,
- Asking the Red Cross to stay out of NO,
- requiring NYFD volunteers to NO to delay 24 hours and take sexual harassment training,
- rejecting rescue assistance from local airboat operators because they lacked the proper number of life preservers and seats (like that matters to someone clinging to a tree)! the airboat operators defied FEMA and helped anyway.
- sending a corps of 31 doctors and nurses from GA poised to go in and help immediately after the hurricane passed on a 4-state 5-day runaround during which they treated exactly 1 person for a cut finger.
- being slow to accept aid from foreign countries (I heard that Sweden or someplace still had water purifiers sitting in an airport waiting for FEMA to okay delivery and a plane from Germany with supplies was sent back).

I'm sure at some point, a list of the individual measures of incompetence will be assembled by someone and published for us all to enjoy our Gov't performance.

Yeah, we go to a disaster with the FEMA we have, not the one we'd like. I simply can't continue to excuse the incompetence of our Gov't in so many areas. As far as I'm concerned, the whole lot of political party hacks that have been given jobs at FEMA should be fired and marched out and made to sit on a roof somewhere in a swamp without food and water for a week.

And folks, NO is not the only city that couldn't evacuate everyone if a disaster hits. Miami also falls into that category not to mention NYC and virtually every major metropolitan area that could be hit by bioterrorism. We lack the public transportation infrastructure to move people out of any urban area and the roads won't accomodate the number of cars that would pour onto the highway in a major emergency either.

Sorry for the rant. I'm still real steamed.

If I'm not mistaken, it was either local or state government that declined the offer by Amtrak to assist with evacuation of NO residents, and the governor who declined the assistance of the national guard prior to the hurricane. There were around 100 hundred school buses available to bus people out of the city who did not have automobiles or money, but the excuse offered by the mayor is that he couldn't find drivers to drive the buses. In this area, the school bus drivers are typically low skill housewives or retirees. If they can be trained to drive a school bus for the school system, I would think that you could find some adult volunteers willing to give it a shot who could be trained in a short time period, being that it was an emergency situation.
Mrs H

Mrs H, your post raises an interesting question that I have been pondering recently. When the mayor of New Orleans gave the order to evacuate the city, did he have legal or moral authority to detain city workers and prevent them from leaving? I believe that the mayor left the city and went to Texas with his family. I'm not sure exactly when he got out.

Mrs. H, a poor response by local and state Gov't doesn't excuse incompetence from the Feds.

I believe the major was in the city the whole time.

Begging you pardon, but mitigation is supposed to be 1 of FEMA's most important tasks - or it used to be, before current admin. put its signature stamp on the agency.(i.e. cronyism)

& according to reports, state & local officials DID do everything they could.Feds woefully inept handling of this cannot be excused away; Sec. of State was attending a Broadway show (Spamalot) & shoe shopping, for instance.

& should we, BTW, really expect a locally-elected official to be responsible for singlehandedly dealing w/ a disaster of the proportions of a cat. 4-5 hurricane that threatens an entire coastline - & more than 1 state?

Please to check my link above, "Disaster waiting..."

& here's a new twist.....

Here is a link that might be useful: Booming

KT, I was pondering how well NYC could evacuate in a hurry....maybe not very well. I understand that there is an iodine capsule that if taken within 24 hours of nuclear radiation fallout that will prevent sickness. How well are we prepared there?

Anna Quindlen has a column in my paper today about Katrina. Her views are honest enough to resound to me.....not biasing or skewing as opportunists tend to do.

What does the Secretary of State have to do with FEMA, hurricanes, New Orleans and other DOMESTIC issues? I'm not a big Bush fan, but some of these arguments are assinine, particularly where the SECRETARY OF STATE is concerned, at least at the beginning of this emergency. And the governor DID NOT LET Red Cross food and water into the SuperDome because they "didn't want to encourage" people hanging around. And, LOCAL GOVERNMENTS (city, county, state) are supposed to be first responders to emergencies. IT'S CALLED FEDERALISM. THEY are closest to the disaster. Along these lines, governors are supposed to ASK for Federal assistance. It's on record that the governor was slow to do so.

The governor REFUSED to even enforce the MANDITORY evacuation. The mayor was left on his own. Anything labeled manditory should be enforced, otherwise it's all hot air.

Additionally, on 9-11 who were the first reponders? I don't recall National Guard troops as being first responders. I believe it was the NYPD, NYFD, and other local city/state agencies.

Did the Federal Government make HUGE mistakes? Sure. When the levies broke, it could have been considered a national security issue, because a whole city was at risk. Bush should have stepped forward. And I have NO IDEA how Brown got his post. He was NOT qualified.

But to COMPLETELY and WHOLELY dismiss the role of a GOVERNOR and a MAYOR in this situation, is just partisan and ideologically driven.

Bush has made lots of mistakes, but this is not soley his fault. We had 8 years of Mr. FEEL GOOD PANTS that didn't push for new levie protection, and other governors and administrations going back to the 50's who had prosperous times who could have addressed this situation.

And, we had enviro-nuts who stopped a relatively benign plan in the 70's that may have helped.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,169396,00.html

I get a kick out of the "American Wetlands" ideolog.
"It's not about blame - that's history." How totally unlike the posts here, since this project may have prevented what eventually happened, and may be ressurected as a project to stop this from happening again. Though not in this story, the judge in the case commented about the "harm" that may result from such a project. I wonder how the wetlands like the bilge from New Orleans now?

But maybe, just maybe, we shouldn't have built a major city where it could be so easily flooded. Of course, we will all pay for these gross miscalculations, just not as dearly as those in New Orleans.

Not my area of expertise, but this is what I've heard. There are medicines, part of the Strategic National Stockpile, pre-positioned across the country that include nerve antidotes for use in the first few hours of an incident. There are also plans for delivering supplemental medical supplies within first 12 hours to be drawn from stockpiles cached in secure areas across the country close to air transportation. Bluntly speaking, I think the goal is to have enough medicine to treat first responders and exposed citizens who could be saved (not those at ground zero and closeby - they are lost). Others not exposed are expected to get out of the way before exposure. As you might imagine, there would likely be a major strain on limited supplies and distribution efforts in the event of a major incident and many difficult decisions. Much of this effort is unfortunately subsumed under Homeland Security and so I am not encouraged. I have occasion to work with EMS directors across the country and know they are very concerned and frustrated that too little of Homeland Security efforts have been aimed at medical response - a significantly larger amount of DHS funding goes to security and prevention.

If there's a local emergency, those of us who work in the hospital where I am employed have an emergency plan. When someone dies and needs CPR, we have a plan. We are individually responsible for doing our assigned tasks to attempt to rescusitate a patient, remove a patient in a fire or other emergency, or evacuate the hospital if need be. It's planned and it's on paper. Emergency management measures are written out and tasks are designated to those who are to be responsible. We don't call in the federal government to do things that we can do ourselves. It looks to me like no effective attempts were made to follow an emergency plan as written, then when the sh*t hit the fan, everyone wanted to blame it on the feds. Sorry, guys, there's alot more to the story, and if we as a society didn't expect the government to wipe our butts, things wouldn't have been as bad.
Mrs H

This rantish article from Mother Jones has something to offend nearly everyone, but some good info nevertheless.

Here is a link that might be useful: left behind

Thanks for that link Althea - pretty dense w/info/opinion.

The thing about the sat. images of oil slicks is rather alarming.......

& w/all due respect, the presumption that LA officials did not follow their emergency plan is false.That is disinformation - spread by the same folks who SAY they we shouldn't play 'the blame game'.

Here is a link that might be useful: Blanco did not fail

Did I miss reading something in the Blanco link? All I saw was that the governor made timely request/s for assistance.

As one who lives near the nation's capitol city, I assure you that even a poorly thought-out emergency plan involves considerably more than requesting assistance. However, I also think that even the best possible emergency plan, properly executed, would have done little or nothing to help those N.O. residents who were determined to stay in the city -- prior experience with category 3 or 4 hurricanes may or may not have provided sufficient knowledge for their self-determination, but I think many of those stay-put residents would have chosen to evacuate if they had had any knowledge of the fallibility of the levees. The fact that for many years there have been available engineering reports advising of the high likelihood of levee failure in storm situation is not synonymous with general public awareness of the potential for failure.

BTW, I've read (AP articles) that the state of LA plans to sue insurance companies to compel payment for damage caused by flooding... in spite of the fact that breached levees cannot be construed as an 'act of god'. Of interest is one statement that less than 30% of N.O. buildings had flood insurance. Possibly I am alone in thinking that if one falls while walking blindfolded on top of a narrow fence/wall/dyke is *not* an act of god and I don't think my insurance company should have to pay for damages accrued thereby.

Randy, here's the other side from those "enviro-nuts."

Here is a link that might be useful: Barrier plan would not have been effective...

Here in my neighborhood a person cannot build much in a declared flood plain these days. Now I know that New Orleans precedes this day and age of "enlightment" so we have to deal with that.

Besides terrorist attacks, hurricanes, earthquakes, and floods I am more concerned where I'm located about nuclear fallout. That's why I wonder about iodine 24 or whatever for preventing nuclear sickness and cancer. This must be taken within 24 hours or so after exposure. Apparantlly the iodine isotope nutralizes the uranium.

Here is a good timeline of events, as recorded in the media. In my estimation, it was the governor's fault above others. She had primary responsibility and blew it. And I guess Amtrack was lying, and the mayor was telling the truth?

Anyway, it was blown by all in power, for not responding faster. My take is that in the Federalist system, local officials are responsible for immediate action. And have to ask for help. I also assume the "officials" who wouldn't accept help from the Red Cross were state officials, not city.

As I said before, when the levies broke Bush should have used national security as an excuse to bypass local officials. And "Brownie" was a flaming idiot. And Political Correctness is dripping all over the place, or maybe just political maneuvering. Either way, backside protecting, not stepping on toes, seems to be the important problems in this case, caused by a lack of control and command structure. Also, just a continual denial about the emerging problem.

And the protection scheme that was faulty in the 70s, why was this shelved, even until today, nearly 30 years later? Why didn't the Corp either: A) appeal, or B) do the work required.

I guess for the same reason we can't drill in Alaska, and we haven't built a new refinery or nuclear power plant since that era: nobody thinks it's worth the lawsuits and red tape required.

Let's see, Katrina killed hundreds so far, over a thousand for sure, somebody remind me, how many people died from 3 mile island?

The bugaboos of enviro-nuts are never as seriuos as the real threats that doing nothing about dangerous situations brings...

I just hope lessons are learned, and changes are made.

Here is a link that might be useful: Timeline of Response...

I worked for the Corps many years ago in the Environmental Division and helped in flood modeling studies. The Corps can't just go out and build levees Randy, they are under DOD and are funded by Congress for those projects and like everything the Gov't does - politics is involved in deciding which of the many potential projects gets funded and by how much.

The projects are designed and funded based on cost-benefit analysis. You spend X dollars on protection to protect X dollars of damage based on a probability of a flood or storm event. A rare event like a Category 4 hurricane or a 100-year flood may not come along for decades and the preventive measures may be so expensive that it may be prohibitive to do anything but roll the dice and hope nothing bad happens on your watch. Our Gov't is pathological about thinking in the short term rather than actually weighing the long term impacts of an action or inaction. Often Corps projects are compromises: protect against a more common Category 3 storm and cross your fingers that a Category 4 never happens. Its also easy to discount the value of things like wetlands for buffering the coast and natural floodplain for absorbing floodwaters when an "engineered" solution is so much more appealing to decision makers who like to spread money and jobs in their district.

The Corps would love to be turned loose to build everything they can concieve of, but the Gov't - especially OMB makes the rules about how costs and benefits are computed and prorated over the expectancy of an event and Congress decides which priority projects gets funded. Damages to nice houses and businesses rates a project. Damage to shotgun shacks and disruption of people's lives doesn't count for much. The Corps certainly merits blame, but also blame OMB for how they make the rules and the President and Congress for how they allocate tax money.

This was predicted too....

Here is a link that might be useful: More blame

& still more......

excerpt:

**... As thousands of hurricane victims went without food, water and shelter in the days after Katrina's early morning Aug. 29 landfall, critics assailed Brown for being responsible for delays that might have cost hundreds of lives.

But Chertoff - not Brown - was in charge of managing the national response to a catastrophic disaster, according to the National Response Plan, the federal government's blueprint for how agencies will handle major natural disasters or terrorist incidents. An order issued by President Bush in 2003 also assigned that responsibility to the homeland security director.

But according to a memo obtained by Knight Ridder, Chertoff didn't shift that power to Brown until late afternoon or evening on Aug. 30, about 36 hours after Katrina hit Louisiana and Mississippi. That same memo suggests that Chertoff may have been confused about his lead role in disaster response and that of his department.

"As you know, the President has established the `White House Task Force on Hurricane Katrina Response.' He will meet with us tomorrow to launch this effort. The Department of Homeland Security, along with other Departments, will be part of the task force and will assist the Administration with its response to Hurricane Katrina," Chertoff said in the memo to the secretaries of defense, health and human services and other key federal agencies.

Chertoff's Aug. 30 memo for the first time declared Katrina an "Incident of National Significance," a key designation that triggers swift federal coordination. The following afternoon, Bush met with his Cabinet, then appeared before TV cameras in the White House Rose Garden to announce the government's planned action.

That same day, Aug. 31, the Department of Defense, whose troops and equipment are crucial in such large disasters, activated its Task Force Katrina. But active-duty troops didn't begin to arrive in large numbers along the Gulf Coast until Saturday.

White House and homeland security officials wouldn't explain why Chertoff waited some 36 hours to declare Katrina an incident of national significance and why he didn't immediately begin to direct the federal response from the moment on Aug. 27 when the National Hurricane Center predicted that Katrina would strike the Gulf Coast with catastrophic force in 48 hours. Nor would they explain why Bush felt the need to appoint a separate task force.

Chertoff's hesitation and Bush's creation of a task force both appear to contradict the National Response Plan and previous presidential directives that specify what the secretary of homeland security is assigned to do without further presidential orders. The goal of the National Response Plan is to provide a streamlined framework for swiftly delivering federal assistance when a disaster - caused by terrorists or Mother Nature - is too big for local officials to handle. ...**

Here is a link that might be useful: Hurricane Can't Reach Ya

Did anyone else see Fri. night's NOW on PBS?

It was really good - covered stuff RE: FEMA that I haven't seen much of elsewhere.

Here is a link that might be useful: NOW

I am always amazed at the proclivity of so many to see disaster around every corner and blame authority for it. The fact is, Katrina happened and we will all get over it and come back stronger. Ne need to blame Bush, or FEMA or anyone. It was a natural disaster and we'll deal with it.

Of course it happened and of course most of us (mostly unaffected) will get over these disasters.

Why have vast government agencies and programs assigned responsibilities and tax moneys to mitigate the impacts of such events and not hold them responsible for performance?

Alive and well Wayne_5....