Its very unfair to compare and contrast, when everyone in this Nation learned from a Lesson that Katrina left. So no one can conclude if Texas would have done better eitherway. Its BS.

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Originally posted by LiquidX Its very unfair to compare and contrast, when everyone in this Nation learned from a Lesson that Katrina left. So no one can conclude if Texas would have done better eitherway. Its BS.

It's not like Katrina was the first major hurricane to hit a major coastal U.S. city. People have known how to evacuate for decades, if not centuries.

Now, there may be more focus on not making some of the stupid mistakes that happened with Katrina (i.e. the buses, mixed signals, etc).

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Originally posted by Shakka It's not like Katrina was the first major hurricane to hit a major coastal U.S. city. People have known how to evacuate for decades, if not centuries. Now, there may be more focus on not making some of the stupid mistakes that happened with Katrina (i.e. the buses, mixed signals, etc).

True, but I never said to what you are referring to. The point of the thread was Texas is acting up in a smarter way then N.O. acted prior to Katrina, thats what my response was referring to. Now.. even here in Florida the response to Rita changed after what Katrina did in N.O. No one is taking chances, so its very unfair to say what the started of this thread is trying to make..

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You Floridans are seasoned veterans!

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Originally posted by Fir3start3r That exuse of not being able to 'find bus drivers in time' is so full of shite...

I'm not trying to make an "exuse" for anybody. There were failures, across all levels in government, in preparing for this hurricane and the fact that 200-odd buses were left at a depot when they could have been used to evacuate people is indeed damning on whoever it was charged with the responsibility to get the people out of there.

However, the point I raised is still, I think, a valid one: where are you going to find 200 bus-drivers on a few hours notice and how are you going to co-ordinate them to pick up those left behind and then leave the city for a safe location in such a small space of time? Again, I'm not making excuses and I'm not asking the question with an alterior motive in mind: you're the Mayor of NO, what steps are you going to go through, in a very limited time-frame, to ensure those buses are utilised?

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They were well aware of their prediciment even before that storm was a gleam in Mother Nature's eye.

Um, according to the factcheck.org link you posted a couple of days ago, they weren't. They knew they were in some danger several days before hand, but the immediacy of the situation really didn't hit them until it was too late. The storm was upgraded from a category 3 storm to a category 5 storm within the space of 15 hours. They didn't, based on the advice of the experts, realise that the levees were going to be breached until after the evacuation was already called. Like I said, you're the Mayor of NO: are you going to call a costly, mandatory evacuation of city the during the advance of a category 3 storm that, according to the best estimates they then had, shouldn't be any danger of breaching the levees they already in place there?

Hindsight is 20/20 my friend. If the mayor of NO had evacuated the city for nothing, he would have been crucified. If the mayor of Galveston hadn't evacuated the city - regardless of what happens next - he would have been crucified. That, I think, is the reality of the circumstances.

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The fact that they had DAYS notice that it was heading in their direction should have tipped them off...government beaucracy aside.

If cities were evacuated every time hurricanes were in danger of hitting the Gulf Coast, when would they ever be occupied?

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They had a documented plan for such an event!

Which "they" had very little time to put into action. Again, that doesn't excuse the fact that provisions weren't made to mobilise the buses in order to evacuate people from the city, but it does explain - to a degree at least - why the evacuation was orchestrated so poorly.

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They probably should have let FEMA know properly what the hell they needed instead of throwing their hands in the air at the last sec.

What? FEMA were running the show for two days before the hurricane hit. Bush declared a state of emergency for the state and FEMA were authorized "to coordinate all disaster relief efforts" during that period. They were in charge, effectively, for long enough to oversee a co-ordinated total evacuation of the city, presuming that the 2x20=40 hours figure for evacuation is accurate.

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Originally posted by St_Andrew Ehm you honestly think they did?! To me it seems nuts if you don't have a number of bus drivers ready for an event like this. Shouldn't be that hard to find really.

It was the first time this has ever happened in NO. Do you think they'd just have 200 bus-drivers sitting around wating for that phone-call to reach them?

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Aweful excuse, come up with something better renegade aka the Nagin apologist

I actually had to google "Nagin" then.... smart-arse.

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Originally posted by Shakka So there's no reason to believe that hundreds of buses that were left in a gravel pit could've been put to any use at all?

Did I say that? What I actually said was:

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even if all those school buses were used then it wouldn't have made a great deal of difference

Now I was being a tad pesimistic there, but even presuming that all those buses were in perfect order (i.e. discounting the 70 that were broken down) and we go by the AP photographer's assessment of 200 buses in that lot and a rate of 22,000 people evactuated per 364 buses, if all those buses were utilised to capacity, the response was perfectly co-ordinated and everyone who stayed was actually intent on leaving, then - given the successful fulfillment of all these variables - they would have been able to evacuate about 10-15% of those who remained. It would have been a more desirable outcome had this actually happened, of course, but would it have significantly - in the grand scheme of things - lessened the scale of the tragedy that befell the town? Not especially. We just would have found some other variable to point the finger at and blame on behalf of the 85-90% of those left behind.

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That site doesn't say anything other than opinionated spin about Fox News

Gee, a media watchdog having a go at Fox News? What is the world coming to...

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so I'm suspect on your claim that it wouldn't have made any difference.

Please, you needn't take my word for it. You're welcome to peruse the couple of dozen articles cited on that page and form your own opinion.

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Even if it was only 364 buses--stick 40 people on each bus and you're talking about 14,000+ people. Certainly not everyone, but certainly not a small number either.

I agree completely. I'm not saying that the perfect utilisation of the buses wouldn't have made any difference, just that - in the context of the entire situation - there are bigger things to worry about (the response, for instance, seems to have been far more poorly co-ordinated than the evacuation). All I'm trying to argue against here is the notion that there was a simple, clear-cut way to have avoided this tragedy. The fact is, this simply isn't the case.

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And as far as getting bus drivers on demand--fuck that. Worst case scenario, if I'm stuck in the Superdome or somewhere else, just give me the fucking keys and I'll drive us all the fuck out of Dodge.

And I'm sure I speak for all of the citizens of New Orleans when I say, "No thanks, I'd rather take my chances in the Superdome"...

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Last edited by Renegade on Sep-22-2005 at 21:14

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Originally posted by Renegade It was the first time this has ever happened in NO. Do you think they'd just have 200 bus-drivers sitting around wating for that phone-call to reach them?

Well if it works anything like it did in Canada, every bus has its driver. So it would just be to make an announcement "all drivers must come and do this bla bla".

Of course there would be plenty that didn't show up cause they wants to save their own ass, not someone elses. But I mean really, Galverstone and Houston managed to get a shit load of buses going on short notice, why could they find drivers but not Nagin? I guess ppl would be more helpful after what happend in NO, but I still think it would have been better if the mayor actually tried to get drivers to those buses than not to try at all.

I'm not saying it's his fault (so no offence to your hero there ), but there certainly was a huge lack in planning when it was a well known fact that NO had a huge population that couldnt manage to get out of there themselves. With some planning it should have been pretty easy to organize those buses imo, even without planning it should have been manageable, but I guess if you don't have any proper planning you have a lot of other things to think about when something like that happens...

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Originally posted by Renegade I'm not trying to make an "exuse" for anybody. There were failures, across all levels in government, in preparing for this hurricane and the fact that 200-odd buses were left at a depot when they could have been used to evacuate people is indeed damning on whoever it was charged with the responsibility to get the people out of there.

I'm not necessarily pointing you out Renegade but yes, that pic over is pretty incriminating.

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However, the point I raised is still, I think, a valid one: where are you going to find 200 bus-drivers on a few hours notice and how are you going to co-ordinate them to pick up those left behind and then leave the city for a safe location in such a small space of time? Again, I'm not making excuses and I'm not asking the question with an alterior motive in mind: you're the Mayor of NO, what steps are you going to go through, in a very limited time-frame, to ensure those buses are utilised?

And here in lies the big question.
Why is it that Houston (and surrounding area) is so proactive then?
Would they have done the same had Katrina not happened?

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Hindsight is 20/20 my friend. If the mayor of NO had evacuated the city for nothing, he would have been crucified. If the mayor of Galveston hadn't evacuated the city - regardless of what happens next - he would have been crucified. That, I think, is the reality of the circumstances. If cities were evacuated every time hurricanes were in danger of hitting the Gulf Coast, when would they ever be occupied? Which "they" had very little time to put into action. Again, that doesn't excuse the fact that provisions weren't made to mobilise the buses in order to evacuate people from the city, but it does explain - to a degree at least - why the evacuation was orchestrated so poorly.

There's a problem here.
New Orleans isn't like any other city along the coast.
They're a cereal bowl below sea level.
The administrative gods should have had this well planned waaaay before now in anticipation of such an event.
You can only go bet against the odds so many times.
Maybe they were hoping it would never happen during thier watch?
We may never know (but hopefully will).

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What? FEMA were running the show for two days before the hurricane hit. Bush declared a state of emergency for the state and FEMA were authorized "to coordinate all disaster relief efforts" during that period. They were in charge, effectively, for long enough to oversee a co-ordinated total evacuation of the city, presuming that the 2x20=40 hours figure for evacuation is accurate. It was the first time this has ever happened in NO. Do you think they'd just have 200 bus-drivers sitting around wating for that phone-call to reach them?

FEMA wasn't running anything; the State governor wouldn't let them. FEMA doesn't have juristication over anything without State approval.

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"...End? No, the journey doesn't end here. Death is just another path...one that we all must take.
The grey rain-curtain of this world rolls back, and all change to silver glass...and then you see it...
...white shores...and beyond...the far green country under a swift sunrise."

Boom

Soooooooo... why was FEMA cutting communication wires and other such things?

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Originally posted by Trancer-X Boom Soooooooo... why was FEMA cutting communication wires and other such things?

WHAM

We can all thank the inept Mr.Brown for that...

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FEMA's Brown To Blame There's plenty of blame going around with what happened in New Orleans. How can reporters and Harry Connick, Jr get into NO when FEMA claims that, with its helicopters and trucks, it can't. But that's not all there is. Michael Brown, FEMA director, was an idiot horseshow floor manager before getting a FEMA job, a product of cronyism. And, FEMA was chopped up and absorbed by, you guessed it, the DHS. Hence, FEMA, needing all the help it could get, denied Amtrak's help in evacuation, turned away experienced firefighters, bars morticians from entering NO, and, god forbid, stops Wal-Mart's supply trucks. This is what happens when the President takes too many vacations.

>>Source<<

___________________
"...End? No, the journey doesn't end here. Death is just another path...one that we all must take.
The grey rain-curtain of this world rolls back, and all change to silver glass...and then you see it...
...white shores...and beyond...the far green country under a swift sunrise."