AFTER THE BREAK OF DAY

Still open?



:wink:

Surprising, no?

Indeed.

It is my opinion, and apparently I'm the only one on this board that holds this, that the screw up in New Orleans was intentional. That the Neocons now running the Federal government eviscerated and intentionally bollix FEMA to the point that it was not only dysfunctional but could not function. The point to be made was that you could not depend on the government, it was incompetent, and thus would serve as further justification for tax cuts and downsizing of the Federal government. I do not think the envissioned the horror occurring in New Orleans, but that is what they created.

Whatever the intent, putting FEMA under the "Homeland Security" umbrella (the very name makes me nauseous--pure spin) assured that its focus would be skewed.

It does seem as though N.O. was woefully unprepared for this, and to some extent, that's a failure of the local gov't.

But the federal response was pathetic--whether intentionally or not--and that's worse. There's enough blame to go around.

Acquiunk raises a good question. Will Americans finally realize that cutting federal programs and cutting taxes is not always a good thing? Will Grover Norquist, who seems to be quiet right now, continue to hold sway with his "let's cut the federal budget until it's tiny enough to flow out the tub drain" philosophy?

What actually wonders my most is that obviously no-one ever thaught of something like this: you don't even have strong-enough pumps! (Germany sent today today 15 mobile pumps, all stronger than any in the USA. We already offered them last week, though.)

Source

seems to me that the reason to put fema in the hsd was simply so they could grab the cash and use it for something else. three guesses what that is.

about the politics...

of the three heavily effected states, blanco is the sole dem governor.

nagin was a republican, changed his affiliation when he ran for mayor. backed a republican against blanco. and was pulled kickin' and screamin' into the kerry camp.

not sure if it means anything, but it caught my attention...

wikipedia.org/wiki/Ray_Nagin

Nonsense. Germans are not the only people in the world who know how to design and build pumps. I suspect the water treatment plants in Chicago (for example) have far greater pumping capacity than any in Germany.

The issue in New Orleans was not so much the capacity of the pumps, as the inexcusable lack of a backup power supply system able to continue functioning in the event of a flood. All this would have required was a platform on which to mount the pump drives and the deisel MG sets that power them in an emergency, higher than the maximum flood level - a very simple design feature.

Okay, so your ambassador in Germany was wrong as well as other statistics. (I'm speaking about mobile pumps - at least they were the strongest to be send worldwide until recently in such a great number.)

Don't forget me. I'm the one who thinks this has turned into a military exercise remember? How to effectively and efficiently create a police state? Practice makes perfect and chance favors the bold and prepared.

wow... if this is feasible in real life, which i defer to your techi knowhow that it is, it's really interesting that none of the big brains thought of it.

Yeh, the raised pump thing seems obvious..


I think there is plenty of fault to distribute, and probably various levels of intent mixed in with fault. I'm still thinking about it all.

On the side of demo'g fema with intent, here is a link to an email I got this morning that lays out a timeline -
http://www.ocnus.net/artman/publish/article_20057.shtml

The author has a point of view that some would regard as bias; still, it's quite a timeline.

Overall, I believe the response of government, both local and federal was adequate to deal with the direct effects of the hurricane. Though the destruction due to this unusually strong storm was great, the public health and safety problem was fairly well managed - as they relate to just the hurricane. This is confirmed by the outcome in Mississippi, where the direct effects of the storm were even more severe than what hit New Orleans. Moreover, even in New Orleans, the early reports on the storm's effects were encouraging.

The key event was the failure of the lake levees and the flooding that subsequently hit new Orleans, and that did not occur until about 30 hours after the storm had passed. That made public safety measures (such as directing people to the largely unprepared Superdome) which might have been effective for the 24 hour effects of the hurricane alone, utterly unsatisfactory and dangerous in the subsequent flooding. In several areas reasonable actions for dealing with the hurricane became positively harmful after the floods. I believe it is clear that there is no good solution to the problem of mitigating such a disaster, and that the fault lies in the failure of measures to prevent it.

The question then becomes, (1) Should the possibility of flooding have been recognized before it occurred? (2) Should this possibility have been included in the City and State's hurricane preparedness and evacuation plans? (3) Should land use and zoning decisions in New Orleans over the past six or so decades have restricted urban development on the city's lowest-lying north side nearest the lake? (4) Should the State of Louisiana have upgraded the levees on Lake Ponchatrain to withstand greater intensity storms - particularly in view of the adjacent areas of the city at lower elevations than the average levels in this lake which drains such a large area? (5) Should the Army Corps of Engineers (Federal Government) have applied a higher design standard to the levees that protected the city from the Mississippi river? (6) Should the State and Federal Governments have enacted a broader regional stormwater management program, better recognizing and providing for flood control in this large region?

I believe it is evident that the answer to all of these questions is yes. I also believe that all the attention given to who did what during the first 24 hours after the levee breech is mostly irrelevant. There was very little material improvement in the outcome that could, at that point, have been achieved. The dye was cast when the lake levee failed.

It is clear that, compared to the prevailing national standards of care to public safety, the relation between land use decisions taken by local government and the infrastructure systems it puts in place to serve them, the State of Louisiana and the City of New Orleans are far below the standards that prevail in other American cities and states. This observation is also consistent with the political history of Louisiana for the past century. From Governor Hughey Long in the 1930s to former Governor James Edwards (now in a Federal prison for graft) Louisiana has entertained the country with a parade of colorful, corrupt, and largely incompetent governors, mayors, and representatives in Congress as well.

The primary fault in all of this rests with the local government. The Federal Government is at fault as well, but it misses the central point to focus on Federal actions (or non-actions) during the recovery phase.

Huey Long may have been colorful, and undoubtedly was corrupt--but he was not incompetent. He gave Louisiana paved roads and public education, which made possible the influx of oil industry robber barons who like the situation just the way it is.

Easily feasible, and this sort of design specification is commonplace.

In fact I don't know much about the design if the back up power supply for the stormwater pumps in New Orleans - only that the system failed when the electrical power transmission lines went out. In adjacent Jackson Parish, where the pumps continued operating the damage was far less and the recovery from the flooding is already complete.

Walter


Walter, A2Kers thank Germany for their assistance. I guess we are lucky that FEMA didn't decline the offer as they have for so many others.

BBB

I guess he forgot flood control. The oil barons were already there when Huey came on the scene.