Hurricane Katrina response

From http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory?id=1087205

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"At the Superdome, we have a report that one shot was fired at a Chinook helicopter," Schneider said, adding that the Chinook is "an extremely large aircraft."
Laura Brown, a Federal Aviation Administration spokeswoman in Washington, said she had no such report.
"We're controlling every single aircraft in that airspace and none of them reported being fired on," she said, adding that the FAA was in contact with the military as well as civilian aircraft.

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I’m not quoting this to prove that the helicopter shootings didn’t happen, but rather to show that it’s possible that they did not happen, and that the rumor of the shots was enough to ground the rescue fleets regardless of the actual facts.

There are multiple reports that people fired upon rescue coptors and motor vehicles in at least two areas in the city. Besides firing on rescue copters, medical facilities set up for emergency care were looted and doctors and nurses assaulted. The Red Cross, which has been ready to move in since August 31, have not been moved into the area because their safety cannot be guaranteed.

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CNN:
New Orleans' Charity Hospital halted efforts to evacuate its patients after it came under sniper fire, according to Dr. Tyler Curiel, who witnessed the incidents.

The attack came as New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin issued "a desperate SOS" for the thousands of people stranded in an around the city's convention center with no food or water and fading hope.

Curiel and his National Guard escorts, were returning to the hospital after dropping off patients at nearby Tulane Medical Center, when someone started shooting at their convoy of Humvees.

"We were coming in from a parking deck at Tulane Medical Center, and a guy in a white shirt started firing at us," Curiel said. "The National Guard (troops), wearing flak jackets, tried to get a bead on this guy."

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and

http://www.eveningtimes.co.uk/hi/news/5043009.html

And sadly, a gang of six looters shot at police who were trying to control the situation. This caused the loss of lives of 3 of the shooters, a severe injury, and the arrest of another.

I don't know about the cannibalism because I haven't heard that, but I am not sure I would be surprised. People turn to cannibalism when it's a matter of survival, and goodness knows there were enough dead bodies. :( I wouldn't be surprised about rape and murder considering the total lack of security in the Superdome, though I haven't heard specific stories yet.

This is crazy to me because, in Thailand, after the tsunami hit, there was little to no looting. People were just concerned about finding their families and getting the hell out of the area to gather themselves enough to come back and rebuild. Southern Thailand, consisting mostly of small fishing villages and local businesses, are pretty much as poor as they come. Why such the stark difference in response by the victims? It boggles my mind and worries me a great deal.

Look, I don't want to get into a long discussion about blaming the victims of this disaster; however I am going to quickly respond to the comments about the tsunami vs Katrina.

Firstly, there WAS looting in Thailand and other affected areas. There was also a child trafficking, rapes in some areas - or at least rumors of these (which is what we have in NOLA).
http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems...2/s1273685.htm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/4145591.stm

Secondly, in most of the areas affected by the Tsunami, guns just aren't readily available. Desperate people, those wanting to protect themselves, or criminals couldn't arm themselves like they could in NOLA.

Thirdly, the response to the tsunami, especially in Thailand, was very rapid. Many of the areas badly hit in Thailand were tourist areas where the police presence was strong. This contrasts markedly with New Orleans whose police department was undermanned at the best of times (and who had a reputation for racism and corruption, which I suspect lead to a lot of people not trusting them) where they had to cope with a population basically abandoned for up to four days in a city that posed a continuing danger through toxic floods.

The Tsunami was a catastrophic event that killed over two hundred thousand people. The magnitude of the disaster cannot be overstated; however most of the death toll in the Tsunami happened during the actual wave. This differs from New Orleans, where (I am supposing here) many people died (and continue to die) as a result of the flooding and lack of aid AFTER the initial storm.

My point is, we just can’t know what would happen in tsunami affected areas if 200 thousand people were stuck in a city with no food, water, electricity or sanitation for four days, where guns were readily available, where huge stores stocking expensive items such as TV’s (which could later be sold to alleviate absolute destitution) or food or clothes were at hand and where the constant threat of poisoned water surrounded you. We can’t know what would have happened, because that wasn’t the situation the tsunami victims found themselves in. It was however, the situation that folks from New Orleans found themselves in.

Anothing thing to consider in the "Why would they" argument is that this was NO. A rather considerable portion of the population were drug addicts who I imagine are suffering withdrawls. Let's face it. It's not exactly known nationwide as a safe place. It's where people would go to party.

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A rather considerable portion of the population were drug addicts who I imagine are suffering withdrawls.

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Can you back up this statement with statistics, Gromgor? It seems like a pretty irresponsible statement to me.

How about this jackass, Rick Scarborough who thinks Katrina was an act of God, punishing a perverse nation.
http://www.stopactivistjudges.org/subscribe.asp

one of my favorite quotes:

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"...a nation moving at breakneck speed toward homosexual marriage, a nation awash in pornography, a nation in which our children are indoctrinated in perversion in the public schools, a nation in which most public displays of The Ten Commandments are considered offensive to the Constitution, a nation in which the elite does all in its considerable power to efface our Biblical heritage...We are sowing the wind. Surely, we shall reap the whirlwind.

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This is the kind of guy that has the president's ear!! Is this kind of rhetoric really any different in style and substance than that which you'd find on extremist Islamic websites? You have to wonder.

http://today.reuters.com/news/newsAr...archived=False

How about an article discussing this same thing?

the only thing close to a statistic in that article was that police estimating there were about 10 000 people currently remaining in New Orleans. It didn't state whether, of those 10 000, how many were drug users.

I did a little research of my own, however. According to a Louisiana Drug Threat Assessment, while New Orleans is a major heroin and transshipment point destined for other areas in the USA, it's use in the New Orleans area stands at about 55 per 100 000. This was a 1999 statistic.
I guess it all depends what you mean when you say "A rather considerable portion of the population were drug addicts"

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Originally posted by kestra
This is the kind of guy that has the president's ear!! Is this kind of rhetoric really any different in style and substance than that which you'd find on extremist Islamic websites? You have to wonder.

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I can hook you up with a link to Nick Berg's beheading to help clear that up for you, that confusion about the difference between this guy and terrorists.

Anyhow I hope this thread stays more or less hurricane related.

Am I the only person who is not sure that the forced evacuation of New Orleans needs to be executed against the last holdouts? If they just don't bring in food and water, and continue to offer people help getting out, won't the biggest part of the public health risk of having people there more or less take care of itself?

On the other hand, the people choosing to stay there so far have come across as pretty floopy. I keep seeing this one guy on Fox who says he had been flushing his toilet with draft beer........ Maybe some people just have to have things spelled out to them in terms of force, I dunno. I don't think the cleanup efforts need to be having to deal with people who refuse to leave, though. So I'm sort of torn. I saw one clip of them having to manhandle this old woman. Still, she needed to be out of there, right?

Hard to watch though.

or maybe bring waivers around with them

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Originally posted by karahd
or maybe bring waivers around with them

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I ___________ agree to not sue anybody for my own hard-headedness.