Mandatory Evacuation Of New Orleans [Archive]

Esperante

08-28-2005, 02:26 PM

Hurricane Katrina has reached status of Stage 5 hurricane and is building up strength in the Gulf of Mexico. The Mayor called for a mandatory evacuation of New Orleans; either flee or seek shelter at the Superdome. The city expects the city to be 30 feet underwater after the storm passes, and will be so for over a month. The city of New Orleans itself is below sea level. Here is a release from the Nat'l Weather Service

URGENT - WEATHER MESSAGE
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE NEW ORLEANS LA
1011 AM CDT SUN AUG 28 2005

..DEVASTATING DAMAGE EXPECTED

HURRICANE KATRINA
A MOST POWERFUL HURRICANE WITH UNPRECEDENTED
STRENGTH...RIVALING THE INTENSITY OF HURRICANE CAMILLE OF 1969.

MOST OF THE AREA WILL BE UNINHABITABLE FOR WEEKS...PERHAPS LONGER. AT
LEAST ONE HALF OF WELL CONSTRUCTED HOMES WILL HAVE ROOF AND WALL
FAILURE. ALL GABLED ROOFS WILL FAIL...LEAVING THOSE HOMES SEVERELY
DAMAGED OR DESTROYED.

THE MAJORITY OF INDUSTRIAL BUILDINGS WILL BECOME NON FUNCTIONAL.
PARTIAL TO COMPLETE WALL AND ROOF FAILURE IS EXPECTED. ALL WOOD
FRAMED LOW RISING APARTMENT BUILDINGS WILL BE DESTROYED. CONCRETE
BLOCK LOW RISE APARTMENTS WILL SUSTAIN MAJOR DAMAGE...INCLUDING SOME
WALL AND ROOF FAILURE.

HIGH RISE OFFICE AND APARTMENT BUILDINGS WILL SWAY DANGEROUSLY...A
FEW TO THE POINT OF TOTAL COLLAPSE. ALL WINDOWS WILL BLOW OUT.

AIRBORNE DEBRIS WILL BE WIDESPREAD...AND MAY INCLUDE HEAVY ITEMS SUCH
AS HOUSEHOLD APPLIANCES AND EVEN LIGHT VEHICLES. SPORT UTILITY
VEHICLES AND LIGHT TRUCKS WILL BE MOVED. THE BLOWN DEBRIS WILL CREATE
ADDITIONAL DESTRUCTION. PERSONS...PETS...AND LIVESTOCK EXPOSED TO THE
WINDS WILL FACE CERTAIN DEATH IF STRUCK.

POWER OUTAGES WILL LAST FOR WEEKS...AS MOST POWER POLES WILL BE DOWN
AND TRANSFORMERS DESTROYED. WATER SHORTAGES WILL MAKE HUMAN SUFFERING
INCREDIBLE BY MODERN STANDARDS.

THE VAST MAJORITY OF NATIVE TREES WILL BE SNAPPED OR UPROOTED. ONLY
THE HEARTIEST WILL REMAIN STANDING...BUT BE TOTALLY DEFOLIATED. FEW
CROPS WILL REMAIN. LIVESTOCK LEFT EXPOSED TO THE WINDS WILL BE
KILLED.

AN INLAND HURRICANE WIND WARNING IS ISSUED WHEN SUSTAINED WINDS NEAR
HURRICANE FORCE...OR FREQUENT GUSTS AT OR ABOVE HURRICANE FORCE...ARE
CERTAIN WITHIN THE NEXT 12 TO 24 HOURS.

ONCE TROPICAL STORM AND HURRICANE FORCE WINDS ONSET...DO NOT VENTURE
OUTSIDE!

MSZ080>082-282100-
HANCOCK-HARRISON-JACKSON-
1011 AM CDT SUN AUG 28 2005
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/files/specials/interactives/hurricanetracker05/index.html

I will keep you updated with maps and such.

Rockefella

08-28-2005, 02:27 PM

That's sad to hear.. :(

On a rather obnoxious note though, I've always wanted to be stuck in a level 5 hurricane.

Esperante

08-28-2005, 02:28 PM

You wouldn't be able to watch it, I'm afraid. You're window would blow out. Guarenteed. And likely whatever structure you're wactching it from.

spi-ti-tout

08-28-2005, 02:33 PM

Holy **** :(

Yes you would be able to be stuck in a Level 5 hurricane. The window blowing out, meaning you could see it with no glass interfereing...anyways....

The newspaper over here hasn't even reported it....bastards - most of uae doesn't know what's going on :(

I can only hope all UCP'ers and family are safe, my sympathy to the dead

Bob

08-28-2005, 02:37 PM

Oh wow, I had no idea it was going to be that bad. Good luck to anyone in New Orleans.

That report is almost... Biblical. ;)

Rockefella

08-28-2005, 02:38 PM

You wouldn't be able to watch it, I'm afraid. You're window would blow out. Guarenteed. And likely whatever structure you're wactching it from.
Not watch it, I meant 'be in the middle of it'. Like fighting it on my own by grabbing on to trees and stuff. I'd prob. last 15 minutes before I died.

Esperante

08-28-2005, 02:39 PM

Brace yourself, N.O....
http://weather.unisys.com/satellite/sat_vis_se_loop-12.gif
Some independent forecasters (meaning not Nat'l Weather Service) are predicting 200 mph winds once it reaches New Orleans. The Superdome, where I would guess thousands will be sleeping in when Katrina hits, was designed for 200.

Rockefella

08-28-2005, 02:40 PM

Brace yourself, N.O....
Cool GIF
Hot damn.. I'm tempted to go down there.

Esperante

08-28-2005, 02:45 PM

Hurricane Camille hit Louisiana at freak speeds in 1969...
http://www.geocities.com/hurricanene/cammap.jpg
Experts predict Katrina will likely die down once it hits land and become a freak storm that would ride the East Coast up to about Nova Scotia where it would die.

Dan Flynn

08-28-2005, 02:46 PM

New Orleans itself sits below sea level. This kind of storm could be utterly vicious. Hope for the best.

Esperante

08-28-2005, 02:48 PM

Katrina hit up greater Miami pretty well, did some pretty good flooding...
http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/storm_graphics/AT12/refresh/AL1205S+gif/205423P_sm.gif
But this thing is just unfreakingbelievably huge. Look at the wind field distribution.

Esperante

08-28-2005, 02:51 PM

Camille damage, '69...
http://sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/a...le/gallery.html

http://www.geocities.com/hurricanen...canecamille.htm

http://www.angelfire.com/ms3/n5ycn/camillepictures.html

Esperante

08-28-2005, 02:54 PM

New Orleans Braces for Powerful Katrina

By ALLEN G. BREED
Associated Press Writer
http://hosted.ap.org/photos/L/LADP10108281839-big.jpg
NEW ORLEANS (AP) -- Monstrous Hurricane Katrina barreled toward the Big Easy on Sunday with 175-mph wind and a threat of a 28-foot storm surge, forcing a mandatory evacuation, a last-ditch Superdome shelter and prayers for those left to face the doomsday scenario this below-sea-level city has long dreaded.

"Have God on your side, definitely have God on your side," Nancy Noble said as she sat with her puppy and three friends in six lanes of one-way traffic on gridlocked Interstate 10. "It's very frightening."

Katrina intensified into a Category 5 giant over the warm water of the Gulf of Mexico on a path to come ashore early Monday in the heart of New Orleans. That would make it the city's first direct hit in 40 years and the most powerful storm ever to slam the city.

"I'm really scared," resident Linda Young said as she fill her gas tank. "I've been through hurricanes, but this one scares me. I think everybody needs to get out."
Rain began falling on southeastern Louisiana by midday Sunday, the first hints of a storm with a potential surge of 18 to 28 feet, topped with even higher waves, tornadoes and as much as 15 inches of rain.

"We are facing a storm that most of us have long feared," Mayor Ray Nagin said in ordering the mandatory evacuation for his city of 485,000 people, surrounded by suburbs of a million more. "The storm surge will most likely topple our levee system."

Conceding that as many as 100,000 inner-city residents didn't have the means to leave and an untold number of tourists were stranded by the closing of the airport, the city arranged buses to take people to 10 last-resort shelters, including the Superdome.

Nagin also dispatched police and firefighters to rouse people out with sirens and bullhorns, and even gave them the authority to commandeer vehicles to aid in the evacuation.

This is very serious, of the highest nature," the mayor said. "This is a once-in-a-lifetime event."

For years, forecasters have warned of the nightmare scenario a big storm could bring to New Orleans, a bowl of a city that's up to 10 feet below sea level in spots and dependent on a network of levees, canals and pumps to keep dry. It's built between the half-mile-wide Mississippi River and Lake Pontchartrain, half the size of the state of Rhode Island.

Estimates have been made of tens of thousands of deaths from flooding that could overrun the levees and turn New Orleans into a 30-foot-deep toxic lake filled with chemicals and petroleum from refineries, and waste from ruined septic systems.

Katrina's eye was expected to make landfall around sunrise Monday on the southeastern Louisiana coast, although Mississippi also was in danger, said Ed Rappaport, deputy director of the National Hurricane Center in Miami. Because Katrina was such a big storm with hurricane-force wind of at least 74 mph extending up to 105 miles from the center, areas far from the eye's landfall could still be devastated.

At 2 p.m. EDT, Katrina's eye was about 180 miles south-southeast of the mouth of the Mississippi River. The storm was moving toward the west-northwest at nearly 13 mph and was expected to turn toward the north-northwest.

A hurricane warning was in effect for the north-central Gulf Coast from Morgan City, La., to the Alabama-Florida line, the hurricane center said. Tropical storm warnings extended east to Indian Pass, Fla., and west to Cameron, La., a spread of about 480 miles.

Despite the dire predictions, a group of residents in a poor neighborhood of central New Orleans sat on a porch with no car, no way out and, surprisingly, no fear.

"We're not evacuating," said 57-year-old Julie Paul. "None of us have any place to go. We're counting on the Superdome. That's our lifesaver."

The Superdome, the 70,000-seat home of football's Saints and the New Year's Sugar Bowl, opened at daybreak Sunday, giving first priority to frail, elderly people on walkers, some with oxygen tanks. They were told to bring enough food, water and medicine to last up to five days.

In the French Quarter, most bars that stayed open through the threat of past hurricanes were boarded up and the few people on the streets were battening down their businesses and getting out.

Sasha Gayer tried to get a train out of town but couldn't. So she walked back to the French Quarter, buying supplies on the way, and then stopped at one of the few bars open on Bourbon Street.

"This is a lot more fun than sitting at home listening to apocalyptic media reports," she said. "This is how you know it's a serious hurricane. You can't find a slice of white bread in the city, but you can still buy beer."

Airport Holiday Inn manager Joyce Tillis spent the morning calling her 140 guests to tell them about the evacuation order. Tillis, who lives inside the flood zone, also called her three daughters to tell them to get out.

"If I'm stuck, I'm stuck," Tillis said. "I'd rather save my second generation if I can."

But the evacuation was slow going. Highways in Louisiana and Mississippi were jammed as people headed away from Katrina's expected landfall. All lanes were limited to northbound traffic on Interstates 55 and 59, and westbound on I-10.

Katrina was "unmitigated bad news" for motorists across the nation because it shut down offshore production of at least 1 million barrels of oil daily and threatened refinery and import operations around New Orleans, said oil analyst Peter Beutel. He predicted crude oil could top $70 a barrel by Monday or Tuesday.

Hotels were spared from evacuation orders to give tourists and locals a place for "vertical evacuation."

Tina and Bryan Steven, a couple from Forest Lake, Minn., who came to attend a conference of emergency medical services, sat glumly on the sidewalk outside their hotel in the French Quarter.

"We're choosing the best of two evils," said Bryan Steven. "It's either be stuck in the hotel or stuck on the road. ... We'll make it through it."

His wife, wearing a Bourbon Street T-shirt with a lewd message, interjected: "I just don't want to die in this shirt."

Only three Category 5 hurricanes - the highest on the Saffir-Simpson scale - have hit the United States since record-keeping began. The last was 1992's Hurricane Andrew, which at 165-mph leveled parts of South Florida, killed 43 people and caused $31 billion in damage.

New Orleans has not taken a major direct hit from a hurricane since Betsy in 1965, when an 8- to 10-foot storm surge submerged parts of the city in seven feet of water. Betsy, a Category 3 storm, was blamed for 74 deaths in Louisiana, Mississippi and Florida.

Rappaport warned that Katrina, already responsible for nine deaths in South Florida as a mere Category 1, could be far worse for New Orleans.

"It would be the strongest we've had in recorded history there," Rappaport said. "We're hoping of course there'll be a slight tapering off at least of the winds, but we can't plan on that. ... We're in for some trouble here no matter what."

...........................

Essentially, the US is looking at it's own share of tsunami style damage.

6'bore

08-28-2005, 02:55 PM

Hot damn.. I'm tempted to go down there.

lol, you have wierd issues dude.

Esperante

08-28-2005, 02:56 PM

Picture from earlier today...
http://www.goes.noaa.gov/EVENTS/EG63.JPG
As of 5:50 Eastern Time...
http://img294.imageshack.us/img294/2552/tnpost31611252659033dh.jpg
Oh snap.

spi-ti-tout

08-28-2005, 03:00 PM

Hot damn.. I'm tempted to go down there.
Great minds think alike. Or maybe insane ones. Whatever.

6'bore

08-28-2005, 03:04 PM

What an inoconvenience this thing is to the people that live there.

Pando

08-28-2005, 03:11 PM

That thing is huuuge!!! It would be cool to get some pictures from the eye of the storm! :)

spi-ti-tout

08-28-2005, 03:12 PM

What an inoconvenience this thing is to the people that live there.

"This is a lot more fun than sitting at home listening to apocalyptic media reports," she said. "This is how you know it's a serious hurricane. You can't find a slice of white bread in the city, but you can still buy beer."
Lol.

Only three Category 5 hurricanes - the highest on the Saffir-Simpson scale
Create a new one maybe?? A new scale?? A new level??

Rockefella

08-28-2005, 03:13 PM

lol, you have wierd issues dude.
I know, I was semi-kidding. Just imagine doing it though. It would be insane... :)

Niko_Fx

08-28-2005, 03:18 PM

I know, I was semi-kidding. Just imagine doing it though. It would be insane... :)

Like with a massive / indestructible glass capsule, in which you can stay inside and watch the whole thing without fearing anything... That'd be awesome :)

On serious note, I do hope everyone evacuated or is at least at a safe place... This thing is going to rip apart everything.

ScionDriver

08-28-2005, 03:19 PM

Right now max winds are at 165, since the storm itself is moving at about 18 mph that means that the winds will really be about 173 mph.

Rockefella

08-28-2005, 03:21 PM

Like with a massive / indestructible glass capsule, in which you can stay inside and watch the whole thing without fearing anything... That'd be awesome :)
Yeah, it would.. but just imagine running through the thing spending every ounce of energy clinging onto trees and concrete structures. It'd be like throwing a small figurine into a washing machine. :D

6'bore

08-28-2005, 03:28 PM

I know, I was semi-kidding. Just imagine doing it though. It would be insane... :)

Yeah I agree that there is a certain temptation within me to see what it was like. I would have to be a serious nutter to go in there though.

Rockefella

08-28-2005, 03:29 PM

I would have to be a serious nutter to go in there though.
I heard this thing called Cocaine may influence us.

6'bore

08-28-2005, 03:33 PM

I heard this thing called Cocaine may influence us.

I'll try and pick some up tomorow on my way bag from the store. I need poop bags, 'coz there is going to be alot of it coming out of y ass when I get in there. :D

"Clevor" Angel

08-28-2005, 03:46 PM

This storm had to come now, their still rebuilding from the 4 vicious ones they had last year. My grandparents live in the Florida panhandle, they're coming to stay with us till this thing dies out.

laxplayer98

08-28-2005, 04:49 PM

6'bore

08-28-2005, 04:50 PM

I heard a news report about an hour ago that people on BOurbon street are drinking and partying still. This storms gonna be awful. When the storm surge comes dead bodies are gonna be floating all over the place from the cemetaries.

Thankyou for being so graphic, try and look on the upside and don't be a pesamist. Maybe there will be no fatalities.

Matra et Alpine

08-28-2005, 05:24 PM

Thankyou for being so graphic, try and look on the upside and don't be a pesamist. Maybe there will be no fatalities.
he really did mean from the cemetaries :(
All fo New Orleans is flod plain and the ground is too wet to bury folsk in. SO everyone is buried above ground. Some nice construction and history walking through them. Does give me a shiver to picture it flooded under water :(

6'bore

08-28-2005, 05:27 PM

my porsche

08-28-2005, 05:30 PM

they are in big concrete boxes above the ground, because NO is basically a swamp

blackcat77

08-28-2005, 05:55 PM

28 foot storm surge for a city that's below sea level. If the levees fail, it could be months before the city would be habitable again. 2.8 million people homeless.

Blue Supra

08-28-2005, 06:16 PM

i know this is going to sound insenstive but in that article it said crude could hit $70USD a barrel.

:eek: :eek: :eek: :eek: :eek:

thats like $1.50 a litre here!

Esperante

08-28-2005, 06:17 PM

he really did mean from the cemetaries :(
All fo New Orleans is flod plain and the ground is too wet to bury folsk in. SO everyone is buried above ground. Some nice construction and history walking through them. Does give me a shiver to picture it flooded under water :(
But the bodies aren't contained in them, anymore. The beauty of above ground cemetaries is that the corpses don't last long; they essentially bake in the monuments.
http://hosted.ap.org/photos/L/LADM12408290011-big.jpg
New Orleans may not look like this in 24 hours...

Blue Supra

08-28-2005, 06:21 PM

what a pleasant thought. Corpes baking...

blackcat77

08-28-2005, 07:25 PM

It's already $70 a barrel in early trading. I suspect it will be at least $85 soon as New Orleans has about 40% of the refineries in the United States. And we don't know the status of the oil rigs in the Gulf. They could be utterly destroyed and if so, we immediately lost 25% of our domestic production.

We very well could have rationing in the near future to go along with ridiculously high prices.

Blue Supra

08-28-2005, 07:34 PM

oh screw that! Im selling my car if it goes over $1.50 a litre. Premium is already $1.34 per Litre.

Spastik_Roach

08-28-2005, 11:02 PM

ITs 1.50 a litre here Blue Supra :(

Blue Supra

08-28-2005, 11:50 PM

oh crap! *puts the 200 up for sale*

NuclearCrap

08-29-2005, 02:51 AM

UPDATE: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9063708/

Luckily the storm has weakened with 150mph winds, and the eye of it is moving a little towards east, but it will still be the strongest slam in New Orleans.

drakkie

08-29-2005, 06:59 AM

oh crap! *puts the 200 up for sale*

dont worry, its like € 1.45 over here for some time now.that is 2.36354 ozzy dollar or 1,78 us dollar !!!!!!!!! :eek: be happy, you get it cheap :)

Esperante

08-29-2005, 07:37 AM

BITS OF SUPERDOME RIP OFF
http://hosted.ap.org/photos/M/MSJB10108291347-big.jpg
NEW ORLEANS (AP) -- Hurricane Katrina plowed into this below-sea-level city Monday with howling, 145-mph winds and blinding rain that flooded some homes to the ceilings and ripped away part of the roof of the Superdome, where thousands of people had taken shelter.

Katrina weakened overnight to a Category 4 storm and turned slightly eastward before hitting land about 6:10 a.m. CDT east of Grand Isle near the bayou town of Buras, providing some hope that this vulnerable city would be spared the storm's full fury.

But National Hurricane Center Director Max Mayfield warned that New Orleans would be pounded throughout the day and that Katrina's potential 15-foot storm surge, down from a feared 28 feet, was still substantial enough to cause extensive flooding.

"I'm not doing too good right now," Chris Robinson said via cellphone from his home east of the city's downtown. "The water's rising pretty fast. I got a hammer and an ax and a crowbar, but I'm holding off on breaking through the roof until the last minute. Tell someone to come get me please. I want to live."
Along the Gulf Coast, the storm hurled boats onto land in Mississippi, lashed street lamps and flooded roads in Alabama, and swamped highway bridges and knocked out power to 28,000 people in the Florida Panhandle. New Orleans, which was in particular peril because it is so low-lying, was ordered evacuated over the weekend, and an estimated 80 percent of its 480,000 residents complied.

At the Superdome, home to 9,000 storm refugees, wind peeled pieces of metal from the golden roof, leaving two holes that let water drip in. People inside were moved out of the way.

Others stayed and watched as sheets of metal flapped and rumbled loudly. From the floor, looking up more than 19 stories, it appeared to be openings of about six feet long. Outside, one of the 10-foot, concrete clock pylons set up around the Superdome blew over.

"The Superdome is not in any dangerous situation," Gov. Kathleen Blanco said.
(ESP says-Bullshit. Besides the 160 mph hurricane closing in, there's no dangerous situation...)

Scores of windows were blown out at some of New Orleans' hotels. At the Windsor Court Hotel, guests were told to go into the interior hallways with blankets and pillows and to keep the doors closed to the rooms to avoid flying glass.

At 10 a.m. EDT, Katrina was centered about 30 miles southeast of New Orleans. That put the western eye wall with some of the fiercest weather over New Orleans. The storms winds dropped to 135 mph as it pushed inland, threatening the Gulf Coast and the Tennessee Valley with as much as 15 inches of rain over the next couple of days and up to 8 inches in the drought-stricken Ohio Valley and eastern Great Lakes.

Katrina was a terrifying, 175-mph Category 5 behemoth - the most powerful category on the scale - before weakening.

Mayfield said at midmorning the worst flooding from storm surge was on the Mississippi coast, east of the eye, with the highest storm surge recorded so far at 22 feet in Bay St. Louis.

Along U.S. 90 in Mississippi, the major coastal route that is home to the state's casinos, sailboats were washed onto the four-lane highway.

"This is a devastating hit - we've got boats that have gone into buildings," Gulfport Fire Chief Pat Sullivan said as he maneuvered around downed trees in the city. "What you're looking at is Camille II."

In 1969, Hurricane Camille, a Category 5 storm, killed 256 people in Mississippi and Louisiana. Storm surges were measured at 24 feet in some places.

In Gulf Shores, Ala., which nearly a year ago was Ground Zero for Hurricane Ivan's destruction, waves crashed over the seawalls and street lights danced in the howling winds.

About 370,000 customers in southeastern Louisiana were without power, said Chenel Lagarde, spokesman for Entergy Corp., the main energy power company in the region.

In New Orleans' French Quarter, where the power went out at 6:35 a.m., hotel residents huddled inside in the midmorning darkness as winds howled, a horizontal rain pinged against the windows, and slate roof tiles tore off.

At the hotel Le Richelieu, the winds blew open sets of balcony french doors shortly after dawn. Seventy-three-year-old Josephine Elow of New Orleans pressed her weight against the broken doors as a hotel employee tried to secure them.

"It's not life-threatening," Mrs. Elow said as rain water dripped from her face. "God's got our back."

Elow's daughter, Darcel Elow, was awakened before dawn by a high-pitched howling that sounded like a trumpeting elephant.

"I thought it was the horn to tell everybody to leave out the hotel," she said as she walked the hall in her nightgown.

For years, forecasters have warned of the nightmare scenario a big storm could bring to New Orleans, a bowl of a city that is up to 10 feet below sea level in spots and relies on a network of levees, canals and pumps to keep dry from the Mississippi River on one side, Lake Pontchartrain on the other.

The fear was that flooding could overrun the levees and turn New Orleans into a toxic lake filled with chemicals and petroleum from refineries, as well as waste from ruined septic systems.

In the uptown area of New Orleans on the south shore of Lake Ponchartrain, floodwaters by 8 a.m. had already intruded on the first stories of some houses and some roads were impassable.

The National Weather Service reported that a levee broke on the Industrial Canal near the St. Bernard-Orleans parish line, and 3 to 8 feet of flooding was possible. The Industrial Canal is a 5.5-mile waterway that connects the Mississippi River to the Intracoastal Waterway.

Crude oil futures spiked to more than $70 a barrel in Singapore for the first time Monday as Katrina targeted an area crucial to the country's energy infrastructure, but the price had slipped back to $68.95 by midday in Europe. The storm already forced the shutdown of an estimated 1 million barrels of refining capacity.

Terry Ebbert, New Orleans director of homeland security, said more than 4,000 National Guardsmen were mobilizing in Memphis and would help police New Orleans streets.

The head of Jefferson Parish, which includes major suburbs and juts all the way to the storm-vulnerable coast, said some residents who stayed would be fortunate to survive.

"I'm expecting that some people who are die-hards will die hard," parish council President Aaron Broussard said.

The evacuation itself claimed lives. Three New Orleans nursing home residents died Sunday after being taken by bus to a Baton Rouge church. Don Moreau, of the East Baton Rouge Parish Coroner's Office, said the cause was probably dehydration.

Katrina, which cut across Florida last week, had intensified into a colossal Category 5 over the warm water of the Gulf of Mexico, reaching top winds of 175 mph before weakening as it neared the coast.

A hurricane warning was in effect for the Gulf Coast from Morgan City, La., to the Alabama-Florida line. Tornado warnings were posted for Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida.

New Orleans has not taken a direct hit from a hurricane since Betsy in 1965, when an 8- to 10-foot storm surge submerged parts of the city in seven feet of water. Betsy, a Category 3 storm, was blamed for 74 deaths in Louisiana, Mississippi and Florida.

Evacuation orders also were posted all along the Mississippi coast, and the area's casinos, built on barges, were closed.

Katrina hit the southern tip of Florida as a much weaker storm Thursday and was lamed for nine deaths. It left miles of streets and homes flooded and knocked out power to 1.45 million customers. It was the sixth hurricane to hit Florida in just over a year.

adamfraser

08-29-2005, 08:15 AM

Thanks for the update Esperante. This is going to be one hell of a disaster unfortunately :(

AF

Esperante

08-29-2005, 08:32 AM

http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/storm_graphics/AT12/refresh/AL1205S+gif/205423P_sm.gif

Esperante

08-29-2005, 08:50 AM

http://customwire.ap.org/dynamic/galleries/305-1.html?SITE=TXHOU&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

Esperante

08-29-2005, 08:52 AM

It's worse than I thought...It looks like the roof covering peeled off-there's a bit of it hanging over the side...
http://customwire.ap.org/photos/L/LADM11408291538-big.jpg
http://customwire.ap.org/photos/L/LADM10908291450-big.jpg
http://customwire.ap.org/photos/L/LADM10808291449-big.jpg
http://customwire.ap.org/photos/M/MSJB10208291355-big.jpg
http://customwire.ap.org/photos/L/LADM10308291252-big.jpg
http://customwire.ap.org/photos/L/LADM10108291232-big.jpg
http://customwire.ap.org/photos/L/LADM11508291549-big.jpg
http://customwire.ap.org/photos/L/LADM11208291532-big.jpg

my porsche

08-29-2005, 02:02 PM

the picture of the van, im pretty sure ive driven dwon that street... :(

i loved new orleans in the day time...night time its a pit, crime and drunks everywehre, but i love the food culture and the old parts of it :(

Esperante

08-30-2005, 09:16 AM

http://hosted.ap.org/photos/L/LADP10108301526-big.jpg

Niko_Fx

08-30-2005, 12:17 PM

My condolences to the people of Alabama, Louisiana and Florida. 70 deaths reported and possibly hundreds more to come :(

taz_rocks_miami

08-30-2005, 12:21 PM

My condolences to the people of Alabama, Louisiana and Florida. 70 deaths reported and possibly hundreds more to come :(

Same here, I hope all those affected can get back on their feet ASAP. 80% of New Orleans is flooded, I can't imagine how long it's gonna take to get things back to normal again. :(

Esperante

08-30-2005, 12:28 PM

taz_rocks_miami

08-30-2005, 12:31 PM

The problem now is that one levee broke and is slowly allowing water into the city, and the other levees prevent water from leaving. Many people are trapped in attics or on roofs, but rescuers cannot always get to them due to livewires or chemicals spilled into the water. :(

Yeah, CNN just said that the levee you mention has a 200 FT hole!! How the hell are they gonna drain all that water out?? :confused:

Esperante

08-30-2005, 12:32 PM

That's the biggest problem. They want to drop sandbags from helicopters to fix the hole and then just run pumps day and night for a while....
It'll soak into the earth after a long time, but not soon enough, I'm afraid...

taz_rocks_miami

08-30-2005, 12:41 PM

cmcpokey

08-30-2005, 02:41 PM

I just thought that I would let the UCP community know about my current state.

I went to school in New Orleans, so I know the city better than a lot of people. I currently serve aboard the USS Shreveport (another LA tie). We have been tasked to deploy for humanitarian aid to the Gulf Coast. I dont know if it will be NOLA, but it very well may be. There will be several Amphibious ships headed to the area to provide food, potable water, medical treatment, and we can even provide beds to sleep in (our primary mission is to take marines around the world, so we have a loarge amount of excess berthings).

So we may be off tonight, or tomorrow. We dont know. Nobody us telling us, but we have been waiting to leave since yesterday morning.

Wish me luck. And please, I know I always get on this rant, support your military, and any other rescue efforts. If you can, volunteer your time, money, or resources.

Esperante

08-30-2005, 02:45 PM

Good luck and Godspeed. :)

If it would be too much to take pictures, I would understand. But in a hundred years pictures of the once in a millenia flooding of a large city will be rare and hard to come by. ;)

cmcpokey

08-30-2005, 02:45 PM

True, where are you gonna pump all the water to without flooding someone else's back yard?

A little info about NOLA. There is a giant pumping system under the city that pumps water through huge pipes out into the Gulf of Mexico. They are electric or diesel generator driven, but they have all failed in the hurricane. The pumps can, under normal operations, pump 1" an hour. They have been trying to get them restarted, but as of yet, it hasnt worked. The rising water levels near the lake have hindered the accessing of the pumps to get them restarted.

Esperante

08-30-2005, 03:13 PM

Here is a very haunting helicopter view of the absolutelydevestated Biloxi area, ground zero. Here gambling is very popular, and coding only allows casinos on the water. So companies design these massive floating buildings. The problem here is, Katrina blew them ashore, pushing these things over land buildings like a plow. The following lengthy video is very chilling...
http://www.wlbt.com

Esperante

08-30-2005, 03:31 PM

:(
More from Nola.com
http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y89/Houstonrush/2074987.jpg

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y89/Houstonrush/2074994.jpg

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y89/Houstonrush/2075016.jpg

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y89/Houstonrush/2074947.jpg

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y89/Houstonrush/2074931.jpg

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y89/Houstonrush/2074921.jpg

Esperante

08-30-2005, 03:31 PM

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y89/Houstonrush/2074910.jpg

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y89/Houstonrush/2074903.jpg

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y89/Houstonrush/2074900.jpg

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y89/Houstonrush/2074889.jpg

This person is swimming in gas soaked water
http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y89/Houstonrush/2074845.jpg

my porsche

08-30-2005, 04:21 PM

this is horrible, that city will never be the same :(

and about the casinos, the news said they will be losing $2,500,000 each per day revenue, and will be opening as soon as conditions permit, well thankfully we can gamble after you lose everything to the sea! yay!

Cotterik

08-30-2005, 04:23 PM

whats happened? i dont watch the news much..

my porsche

08-30-2005, 04:29 PM

a GIANT hurricane nailed new orleans and biloxi mississipi

got hemi?

08-30-2005, 04:32 PM

they have evacuated the superdome, i heard

my porsche

08-30-2005, 04:32 PM

sad story my mom passed on:

my brothers friend is from new orleans, and his family have all their relatives from the NO
at there house here, and his grandpa was watching the news and said "my life is over" hes in his 90's and his house, stuff, everything is gone, he lived there for 75 years!

Dino Scuderia

08-30-2005, 04:36 PM

The scenes from this just leave me speechless.

got hemi?

08-30-2005, 04:37 PM

are you from that area Dino?

my porsche

08-30-2005, 04:38 PM

Esperante

08-30-2005, 05:02 PM

its really scary to think that ive been to the places in most of these pictures, and that as i was leaving NO a few years ago tropical storm allison was about to hit it :( its just weird to know youve been to these places that are devastated
I had the exact same problem with 9-11.

Of course, this isn't the first time New Orleans has been flooded. Being in negative elevation, it's flooded several times before, but it just so happens that this is ultramodern New Orleans. If the city could recover form floodings hundreds of years ago, it will again.

Dino Scuderia

08-30-2005, 05:26 PM

are you from that area Dino?

No, I'm in N. Georgia...we just got strong winds, downed trees and power outages.

got hemi?

08-30-2005, 05:26 PM

but not flooding? thats good

Dino Scuderia

08-30-2005, 05:29 PM

but not flooding? thats good

Not much rain at all, so a best case scenario here.

got hemi?

08-30-2005, 05:34 PM

well thats good, its coming tords[sp] me right now, but it shouldnt hit hard here

lithuanianmafia

08-30-2005, 07:15 PM

I just saw the pictures on CNN, but it's hillarious to see Nancy Grace comment on it cus she really doesn't know jack shit. the reporter who's in New Orleans is saying that the ppl there are being told to try to start a fire, mainly with a BBQ, to cook any food that didn't get caught in the water and use it for eating. and she snapped and said "how the hell can you use your BBQ without electricy?!?!" and the reporter just kinda looked at her like she was completely retarded. :p a lil bit of humor to a truly devestating situation.
if anyone in the UCP community has been caught in the storm, all I have to say is good luck to you and wish you the best and your families

Esperante

08-30-2005, 07:17 PM

Now people are complaining about the rescue missions-rescue operatives are saying (as I said earlier) that some people cannot be rescued to do gasses in the water or live power lines, and this just isn't satisfactory to thsoe trapped in their attics.

Guess what? Those trapped are supposed to be
A-In the Superdome
or
B-Far away from NO

lithuanianmafia

08-30-2005, 07:23 PM

Esperante

08-30-2005, 07:38 PM

And it's not even just common sense-it's law. They were by law to be evacuated.

Rockefella

08-30-2005, 09:38 PM

ya, there's always some dumbasses who think they can ride it out, no matter how strong the hurricane is
Like me. :)

CSL

08-31-2005, 01:47 AM

****all Residents On The East Bank Of Orleans And Jefferson Remaining In The Metro Area Are Being Told To Evacuate As Efforts To Sandbag The Levee Break Have Ended. The Pumps In That Area Are Expected To Fail Soon And 9 Feet Of Water Is Expected In The Entire East Bank. Within The Next 12-15 Hours****

my porsche

08-31-2005, 05:03 AM

when i first read that, i thought you were saying to f*ck all the residents :p

they are clling this "our tsunami" now

Rockefella

08-31-2005, 11:05 AM

Matra et Alpine

08-31-2005, 12:57 PM

According to the BBC, the New Orleans mayer has said hundreds, possibly thousand died in the city.

VERY saddened to hear this. Thoughts are with those in the area and with friends/family there

:(

UCR

08-31-2005, 01:00 PM

they are clling this "our tsunami" now

Lol the americans think thats a tsunami!!

Fleet 500

08-31-2005, 01:45 PM

Well, when 80% of the city is under water, it may not be a tsunami, but it certainly is a major flood.

UCR

08-31-2005, 01:47 PM

Yes i get an aguement with fleet! :D

a tsunami is a giant tidal wave u dumass.

Pando

08-31-2005, 02:16 PM

Yes i get an aguement with fleet! :D
ROTFLMAO

Rockefella

08-31-2005, 02:21 PM

This is nowhere near a Tsunami. The tsunami was unexpected, caused so much more damage, and killed 150+ thousand people, and has still scarred Indonesia to this day. People were evacuated a day before Katrina hit, and this wasn't a big tidal wave.

taz_rocks_miami

08-31-2005, 02:41 PM

Lol the americans think thats a tsunami!!

The mayor called it that due to the level of devestation. Your "joke" is uncalled for and in very bad taste UCR. :mad:

Esperante

08-31-2005, 02:53 PM

Lol the americans think thats a tsunami!!
I could make a thousand jokes pertaining to how you thought your bombings were 9-11, but I won't, because it's completely uncalled for and disrespectful. While I usually think your humour is in *relatively* good taste, you still have to learn when to stop 'poking fun' at things.

UCR

08-31-2005, 02:57 PM

Sorry lads, it was out of order.

No offence was intened but in the future i will think twice.

Fleet 500

08-31-2005, 05:04 PM

Yes i get an aguement with fleet! :D

a tsunami is a giant tidal wave u dumass.
Sorry, you're wrong.
Scientifically speaking, a tsunami is a "seismic sea wave" and has nothing to do with tidal waves which are completely different.
Nice try, though.

my porsche

08-31-2005, 05:04 PM

Hector is the only one who had any common sense and grasped the concept of my comment, and esperante

come on people, i wasnt talking about a stupid wave

Matra et Alpine

08-31-2005, 06:24 PM

I could make a thousand jokes pertaining to how you thought your bombings were 9-11,
WE didn't.

A prick leading our country decided to play the 'fear' card by aligning the acts. Pleae don't take a nations viewpoint from the coverage given to a PM most of whom don't support - even in his own party !!!!

7/7 was just another terrorist attack on London.

Esperante

08-31-2005, 06:34 PM

Matra et Alpine

08-31-2005, 06:55 PM

The news media certainly made an event of it here. While I'd hate for this whole situation to be overdone/under respected, media coverage here made it seem like Britain had been stabbed multiple times. I've never been to Britain-I can't really make much assumptions about the people. :p
yeah the Omagh bombing in '98 killed half as many and didnt' get very much coverage :(
Maybe because of the history of the IRA being funded by NORAID collections ???
But lets leave that for now.....

Will their be enough National Guard units available to assist the clean up and restoration ????

Esperante

08-31-2005, 07:07 PM

Not known/released yet. Officials are now saying they found a second broken levee (200 yards long) and it may be months before it can be fixed. By that time the water will have done enough damage to wooden structures that they will have to be substantially remodeled/razed.

yeah the Omagh bombing in '98 killed half as many and didnt' get very much coverage :(
Maybe because of the history of the IRA being funded by NORAID collections ???

If the IRA struck the US it would've gotten plenty of airtime. Generally, media wise, everything is very ethnocentric. Anything not directly concerning the US doesn't get much mention.
Anyway...
Devastating-If estimations are correct, this will be the mostly deadly disaster to strike the United States since the 1906 earthquake of San Francisco. :(

New Orleans Mayor: Thousands Likely Dead

By ADAM NOSSITER
Associated Press Writer
http://hosted.ap.org/photos/L/LADP15009010035-big.jpg

NEW ORLEANS (AP) -- With thousands feared drowned in what could be America's deadliest natural disaster in a century, New Orleans' leaders all but surrendered the streets to floodwaters Wednesday and began turning out the lights on the ruined city - perhaps for months.

Looting spiraled so out of control that Mayor Ray Nagin ordered virtually the entire police force to abandon search-and-rescue efforts and focus on the brazen packs of thieves who have turned increasingly hostile.

Nagin called for an all-out evacuation of the city's remaining residents. Asked how many people died, he said: "Minimum, hundreds. Most likely, thousands."

With most of the city under water, Army engineers struggled to plug New Orleans' breached levees with giant sandbags and concrete barriers, and authorities drew up plans to clear out the tens of thousands of remaining people and practically abandon the below-sea-level city. Most of the evacuees - including thousands now suffering in the hot and muggy Superdome - will be moved to the Astrodome in Houston, 350 miles away.
There will be a "total evacuation of the city. We have to. The city will not be functional for two or three months," Nagin said. And he said people would not be allowed back into their homes for at least a month or two.

If the mayor's death-toll estimate holds true, it would make Katrina the worst natural disaster in the United States since at least the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and fire, which have blamed for anywhere from about 500 to 6,000 deaths. Katrina would also be the nation's deadliest hurricane since 1900, when a storm in Galveston, Texas, killed between 6,000 and 12,000 people.

In Mississippi, bodies are starting to pile up at the morgue in hard-hit Harrison County. Forty corpses have brought to the morgue already, and officials expect the death toll in the county to climb well above 100.

President Bush flew over New Orleans and parts of Mississippi's hurricane-blasted coastline in Air Force One. Turning to his aides, he said: "It's totally wiped out. ... It's devastating, it's got to be doubly devastating on the ground."
"We're dealing with one of the worst national disasters in our nation's history," Bush said later in a televised address from the White House, which most victims could not see because power remains out to 1 million Gulf Coast residents.

The federal government dispatched helicopters, warships and elite SEAL water-rescue teams in one of the biggest relief operations in U.S. history, aimed at plucking residents from rooftops in the last of the "golden 72 hours" rescuers say is crucial to saving lives.

As fires burned from broken natural-gas mains, the skies above the city buzzed with National Guard and Coast Guard helicopters frantically dropping baskets to roofs where victims had been stranded since the storm roared in with a 145-mph fury Monday. Atop one apartment building, two children held up a giant sign scrawled with the words: "Help us!"

Looters used garbage cans and inflatable mattresses to float away with food, blue jeans, tennis shoes, TV sets - even guns. Outside one pharmacy, thieves commandeered a forklift and used it to push up the storm shutters and break through the glass. The driver of a nursing-home bus surrendered the vehicle to thugs after being threatened.

Police said their first priority remained saving lives, and mostly just stood by and watched the looting. But Nagin later said the looting had gotten so bad that stopping the thieves became the top priority for the police department.

"They are starting to get closer to heavily populated areas - hotels, hospitals, and we're going to stop it right now," Nagin said in a statement to The Associated Press.

Hundreds of people wandered up and down shattered Interstate 10 - the only major freeway leading into New Orleans from the east - pushing shopping carts, laundry racks, anything they could find to carry their belongings.

On some of the few roads that were still open, people waved at passing cars with empty water jugs, begging for relief. Hundreds of people appeared to have spent the night on a crippled highway.

Starting Thursday, authorities planned to move at least 25,000 storm refugees to the Astrodome in a vast convoy of some 500 buses provided by the federal government. With the air-conditioning knocked out, the Superdome has become stifling, its toilets are broken and there is nowhere for anyone to bathe.

Nagin, whose pre-hurricane evacuation order got most of his city of a half a million out of harm's way, estimated 50,000 to 100,000 people remained, and said that 14,000 to 15,000 a day could be evacuated in ensuing convoys.

"We have to," Nagin said. "It's not living conditions."

He also expressed concern about people staying in the water: "People walking in that water with those dead bodies, it can get in your pores, you don't have to drink it."

In addition to the Astrodome solution, the Federal Emergency Management Agency was considering putting people on cruise ships, in tent cities, mobile home parks, and so-called floating dormitories.

The floodwaters streamed into the city's streets from two levee breaks near Lake Pontchartrain a day after New Orleans thought it had escaped catastrophic damage from Katrina. The floodwaters covered 80 percent of the city, in some areas 20 feet deep, in a reddish-brown soup of sewage, gasoline and garbage.

Around midday, officials with the state and the Army Corps of Engineers said the water levels between the city and Lake Pontchartrain had equalized, and water had stopped spilling into New Orleans, and even appeared to be falling. But the danger was far from over.

The Army Corps of Engineers said it planned to use heavy-duty Chinook helicopters to drop 15,000-pound bags of sand and stone as early as Wednesday night into the 500-foot gap in the failed floodwall.

But the agency said it was having trouble getting the sandbags and dozens of 15-foot highway barriers to the site because the city's waterways were blocked by loose barges, boats and large debris.

In Washington, the Bush administration decided to release crude oil from the federal petroleum reserves after Katrina knocked out 95 percent of the Gulf of Mexico's output. But because of the disruptions and damage to the refineries, gasoline prices surged above $3 a gallon in many parts of the country.

The death toll has reached at least 110 in Mississippi alone. But the full magnitude of the disaster had been unclear for days - in part, because some areas in both coastal Mississippi and New Orleans are still unreachable, but also because authorities' first priority has been the living.

In Mississippi, for example, ambulances roamed through the passable streets of devastated places such as Biloxi, Gulfport, Waveland and Bay St. Louis, in some cases speeding past corpses in hopes of saving people trapped in flooded and crumbled buildings.

State officials said Nagin's guess of thousands dead seemed plausible.

Lt. Kevin Cowan of the state Office of Emergency Preparedness said it is too soon to say with any accuracy how many died. But he noted that since thousands of people had been rescued from roofs and attics, it could be assumed that there were lots of others who were not saved.

"You have a limited number of resources, for an unknown number of evacuees. It's already been several days. You've had reports there are casualties. You all can do the math," he said.

On the flooded streets of New Orleans, dozens of fishermen from up to 200 miles away floated in on caravans of boats to pull residents out.

One of those rescued was 40-year-old Kevin Montgomery, who spent three days shuttling between the attic of a one-story home and a canopy he built on the roof.

Every once in a while, Mongtomery would see a body float by. But he cannot swim and had to fight the urge to wade in and tie them down.

"It was terrible," he said. "All I could do was pass them by and hope that God takes care of the rest of that."

---

Associated Press reporters Holbrook Mohr, Mary Foster, Allen G. Breed, Cain Burdeau and Jay Reeves contributed to this report.
........................................
On a lighter note, this will really affect New Orleans' infamous reputation as a supernatural/ghost hot spot.

lithuanianmafia

08-31-2005, 08:18 PM

http://us.news3.yimg.com/us.i2.yimg.com/p/nm/20050901/2005_08_31t084059_450x354_us_weather_katrina.jpg?x =380&y=299&sig=WgztHcYgmgB2VBj8nzAujA--

LOOTING, FEAR

NEW ORLEANS (Reuters) - State governors ordered 10,000 additional National Guard troops to the area -- in part to quell the looting -- bringing the total to 21,000.

Many food and convenience stores in New Orleans had their doors or windows smashed. Some looters were seen calmly carrying contents out of stores.

The extent of the looting spread fear in the city famous for its jazz and easygoing lifestyle.

Cheryl Richou, from St. Charles Parish, a rural area west of New Orleans, said of the looters, "Everybody's scared they'll start coming to St. Charles."

Several television networks reported that New Orleans was pulling 1,500 police from the search-and-rescue mission to deal with looting and lawlessness in the streets.

A fleet of prison buses arrived at the storm-battered Superdome stadium to take 23,000 refugees to the Houston Astrodome 350 miles away.

Stranded people were running out of food and water and growing desperate. Some pushed shopping carts filled with their belongings along freeways, with one cart holding a young girl who had passed out. Others asked for food and water.

"It's a lot of chaos right now," Louisiana state police Director H.L. Whitehorn said.

New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin estimated it would be 12 to 16 weeks before residents could return. A million people fled the New Orleans area before Katrina arrived. But former Mayor Sidney Barthelemy estimated 80,000 were trapped in the city.

The stricken city got some good news as water finally stopped flowing in and started flowing out, a senior official with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said.

"It's not a significant decrease but it's not rising any more," said Al Naomi, a senior project manager with the Corps. "It will still take a while to get the water out of the city.

The U.S. military set out to stanch the flow of water into New Orleans from Lake Pontchartrain through breaches in the levee system that holds water out of the city, much of which sits below sea level.

http://us.news3.yimg.com/us.i2.yimg.com/p/afp/20050901/capt.sge.dog60.010905014820.photo03.photo.default-384x240.jpg?x=380&y=237&sig=2kaHJkLgMwNIp.oVg7.9jA--

CSL

08-31-2005, 08:39 PM

FINALLY

Martial Law declared in New Orleans

UCR

09-01-2005, 12:19 AM

Sorry, you're wrong.
Scientifically speaking, a tsunami is a "seismic sea wave" and has nothing to do with tidal waves which are completely different.
Nice try, though.
Ok, but did that happen in New orleans?

No.

Nice try, though.

CSL

09-01-2005, 12:31 AM

Ok, but did that happen in New orleans?

No.

Nice try, though.

No what happen to New Orleans and the Gulf Coast while similar has nothing to do with what causes tsunamis

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Storm_surge
http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/HAW2/english/storm_surge.shtml
http://www.fema.gov/hazards/hurricanes/surge.shtm
http://www.usatoday.com/weather/tg/wsurge/wsurge.htm

IBrake4Rainbows

09-01-2005, 12:34 AM

THE COMMENT FROM THE MAYOR WAS THAT THIS "WAS LIKE THE INDONESIAN TSUNAMI!!!!". They never said it was one, they just said the damage looked a lot like it.

It's a bad situation to be in, New Orleans is mostly below sea level, and the water continues to rise as the soil becomes saturated. Theres nowhere for these people to go. I'd seriously consider raising the town and starting again.

It's a huge city thats been utterly decimated.

NOW LET'S GET BACK ON TOPIC.

Fleet 500

09-01-2005, 12:52 AM

Ok, but did that happen in New orleans?

No.

Nice try, though.
I never said it did... I meant that the damage was in some ways similar to the damage from a tsunami (which are caused by earthquakes and, more rarely, volcanic activity).

Hopefully, you now know the difference between tidal waves and tsunamis.

henk4

09-01-2005, 03:39 AM

Interesting comment in this morning's newspaper overhere. apparently the construction tolerances of the Army Corps of Engineers allow a major breach in the dikes every 250 years. Standards used in Holland allow such a thing happening (statistically of course) every 1250 years, while for dikes in the neighbourhood of cities a one in every 10,000 years has been calculated.

Not surprisingly, the budget of the New Orleans department of the ACE has gone over the recent years.

my porsche

09-01-2005, 05:14 AM

interesting bit of news this morning:

one guy possibly stole a bus to drive from the superdome to the astrodome

another very interesting bit:

rescue missions from the superdome to the astrodome havebeen halted because people were firing shots at the choppers that were trying to rescue people

these people are already complaining and bitching about this when we're doing out best to rescue them, f*cking ingrates, its only been what, 2-3 days? we're doing our best

henk4

09-01-2005, 06:21 AM

Matra et Alpine

09-01-2005, 07:07 AM

just heard the following: President Bush will severely punish those woh benefit/profit from the New Orleans disaster. Who is he targeting? The fuel stations that are now selling at high prices due to the shortage. What happened to oil prices before the disaster struck? Where does the free market stop?
shame he doens't apply that to Iraq and Halliburton :p

Pando

09-01-2005, 09:15 AM

just heard the following: President Bush will severely punish those woh benefit/profit from the New Orleans disaster. Who is he targeting? The fuel stations that are now selling at high prices due to the shortage. What happened to oil prices before the disaster struck? Where does the free market stop?
That's so Bush, he thinks like a four year old. Too bad his not playing in the sandbox, but running one of the biggest countries in the world. :(

Fleet 500

09-01-2005, 12:57 PM

That's so Bush, he thinks like a four year old. Too bad his not playing in the sandbox, but running one of the biggest countries in the world. :(
Well, I don't think there's room for Bush in that sandbox... Clinton and his pal Monica are already in it. ;)

Rockefella

09-01-2005, 01:16 PM

Well, I don't think there's room for Bush in that sandbox... Clinton and his pal Monica are already in it. ;)
I give Clinton props for cheating. Hillary Clinton is ugly, but Lewinsky is fat. Bush does think like a juvenile playing RISK though.

On a side note, gas prices here have gone up to about 3.15 for unleaded regular per gallon. :eek:

Matra et Alpine

09-01-2005, 01:16 PM

Well, I don't think there's room for Bush in that sandbox... Clinton and his pal Monica are already in it. ;)
IRRELEVANT.

Clinton isnt' President any more. GWB is. Only comments on him in the present are appropriate

The buck stops at GWB - well it would if he wasn't siphoning it off to make his buddies uber-rich !!!!!

Fleet 500

09-01-2005, 01:19 PM

Rockefella

09-01-2005, 01:21 PM

I have a great idea...
Why doesn't UCP do what the person below suggests?
Put A box under the UCP title that says Bush is a "liar," yes "stole the election," won it fair and square "want to take over the world's oil," not necessarily, but it IS the source of his family fortune, etc.

Then I and the other non-Bush bashers won't have to read this nonsense over and over again.
See quote.

Pando

09-01-2005, 01:45 PM

I have a great idea...
Why doesn't UCP do what the person below suggests?
Put A box under the UCP title that says Bush is a "liar," "stole the election," "want to take over the world's oil," etc.

Then I and the other non-Bush bashers won't have to read this nonsense over and over again.
By the way, I was just wondering doesn't that make you concerned or worried that so many people EVERYWHERE "lie" and talk so much "trash" about Bush? I mean if it was all lies and complaining in general wouldn't it have died down after a while? Also when Bush makes an ass off himself on national television with statements like the one above and many more what do you feel? Do you just simply agree with him? or do you feel dissapointed? do you ever doubt his skills in running your country? Do you honestly still stand 100% behind the Iraq war and all the other whatnots that you've stated a few months ago or have you changed your mind about anything at all? Is EVERYTHING good in the us still because of Bush and everything bad because of Clinton? Ever feel a slight doubt that you might be wrong?
I'm honestly NOT trying to get into all this again neither am I trying to be "funny", I'm just curious.

Rockefella

09-01-2005, 01:56 PM

By the way, I was just wondering doesn't that make you concerned or worried that so many people EVERYWHERE "lie" and talk so much "trash" about Bush? I mean if it was all lies and complaining in general wouldn't it have died down after a while? Also when Bush makes an ass off himself on national television with statements like the one above and many more what do you feel? Do you just simply agree with him? or do you feel dissapointed? do you ever doubt his skills in running your country? Do you honestly still stand 100% behind the Iraq war and all the other whatnots that you've stated a few months ago or have you changed your mind about anything at all? Is EVERYTHING good in the us still because of Bush and everything bad because of Clinton? Ever feel a slight doubt that you might be wrong?
I'm honestly NOT trying to get into all this again neither am I trying to be "funny", I'm just curious.
That somewhat paints a picture in my head. Fleet and some fellow Republicans are like that one kid who tells everyone around him that they're all wrong, just because the kid feels that HE is right.

Esperante

09-01-2005, 02:36 PM

I can't believe you tools turned this into another political debate.

People in the Superdome were moved to the convention centre in New Orleans to keep some of the population under control, but it seems to be heading in the other direction. People are beating each other, dragging the dead around, looting the dead, and raping...
New Orleans Mayor Issues 'Desperate SOS'

By ADAM NOSSITER
Associated Press Writer
http://hosted.ap.org/photos/L/LAEG11909012131-big.jpg
military helicopter makes a food and water drop to flood victims near the convention center in New Orleans, Thursday, Sept. 1, 2005. Officials called for a mandatory evacuation of the city, but many resident remained in the city and had to be rescued from flooded homes and hotels and remain in the city awaiting a way out. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)
NEW ORLEANS (AP) -- Storm victims were raped and beaten, fights and fires broke out, corpses lay out in the open, and rescue helicopters and law enforcement officers were shot at as flooded-out New Orleans descended into anarchy Thursday. "This is a desperate SOS," the mayor said.

Anger mounted across the ruined city, with thousands of storm victims increasingly hungry, desperate and tired of waiting for buses to take them out.

"We are out here like pure animals. We don't have help," the Rev. Issac Clark, 68, said outside the New Orleans Convention Center, where corpses lay in the open and the and other evacuees complained that they were dropped off and given nothing - no food, no water, no medicine.

About 15,000 to 20,000 people who had taken shelter at the convention center to await buses grew increasingly hostile. Police Chief Eddie Compass said he sent in 88 officers to quell the situation at the building, but they were quickly beaten back by an angry mob.

We have individuals who are getting raped, we have individuals who are getting beaten," Compass said. "Tourists are walking in that direction and they are getting preyed upon."

In hopes of defusing the unrest at the convention center, Mayor Ray Nagin gave the refugees permission to march across a bridge to the city's unflooded west bank for whatever relief they can find. But the bedlam at the convention center appeared to make leaving difficult.

A military heliocpter tried to land at the convention center several times to drop off food and water. But the rushing crowd forced the choppers to back off. Troopers then tossed the supplies to the crowd from 10 feet off the ground and flew away.

National Guardsmen poured in to help restore order and put a stop to the looting, carjackings and gunfire that have gripped New Orleans in the days since Hurricane Katrina plunged much of the city under water.

In a statement to CNN, Nagin said: "This is a desperate SOS. Right now we are out of resources at the convention center and don't anticipate enough buses. We need buses. Currently the convention center is unsanitary and unsafe and we're running our of supplies."

In Washington, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said the government is sending in 1,400 National Guardsmen a day to help stop looting and other lawlessness in New Orleans. Already, 2,800 National Guardsmen are in the city, he said.

But across the flooded-out city, the rescuers themselves came under attack from storm victims.

"Hospitals are trying to evacuate," said Coast Guard Lt. Cmdr. Cheri Ben-Iesan, spokesman at the city emergency operations center. "At every one of them, there are reports that as the helicopters come in people are shooting at them. There are people just taking potshots at police and at helicopters, telling them, `You better come get my family.'"

Some Federal Emergency Management rescue operations were suspended in areas where gunfire has broken out, Homeland Security spokesman Russ Knocke said in Washington. "In areas where our employees have been determined to potentially be in danger, we have pulled back," he said.

A National Guard military policeman was shot in the leg as he and a man scuffled for the MP's rifle, police Capt. Ernie Demmo said. The man was arrested.

"These are good people. These are just scared people," Demmo said.

Outside the Convention Center, the sidewalks were packed with people without food, water or medical care, and with no sign of law enforcement. Thousands of storm refugees had been assembling outside for days, waiting for buses that did not come.

At least seven bodies were scattered outside, and hungry people broke through the steel doors to a food service entrance and began pushing out pallets of water and juice and whatever else they could find.

An old man in a chaise lounge lay dead in a grassy median as hungry babies wailed around him. Around the corner, an elderly woman lay dead in her wheelchair, covered with a blanket, and another body lay beside her wrapped in a sheet.

"I don't treat my dog like that," 47-year-old Daniel Edwards said as he pointed at the woman in the wheelchair. "I buried my dog." He added: "You can do everything for other countries but you can't do nothing for your own people. You can go overseas with the military but you can't get them down here."

The street outside the center, above the floodwaters, smelled of urine and feces, and was choked with dirty diapers, old bottles and garbage.

"They've been teasing us with buses for four days," Edwards said.

People chanted, "Help, help!" as reporters and photographers walked through. The crowd got angry when journalists tried to photograph one of the bodies, and covered it over with a blanket. A woman, screaming, went on the front steps of the convention center and led the crowd in reciting the 23rd Psalm.

John Murray, 52, said: "It's like they're punishing us."

The Superdome, where some 25,000 people were being evacuated by bus to the Houston Astrodome, descended into chaos as well.

Huge crowds, hoping to finally escape the stifling confines of the stadium, jammed the main concourse outside the dome, spilling out over the ramp to the Hyatt hotel next door - a seething sea of tense, unhappy, people packed shoulder-to-shoulder up to the barricades where heavily armed National Guardsmen stood.

At the front of the line, heavily armed policemen and guardsmen stood watch and handed out water as tense and exhausted crowds struggled onto buses. At the back end of the line, people jammed against police barricades in the rain. Luggage, bags of clothes, pillows, blankets were strewn in the puddles.

Many people had dogs and they cannot take them on the bus. A police officer took one from a little boy, who cried until he vomited. "Snowball, snowball," he cried. The policeman told a reporter he didn't know what would happen to the dog.

Fights broke out. A fire erupted in a trash chute inside the dome, but a National Guard commander said it did not affect the evacuation. After a traffic jam kept buses from arriving at the Superdome for nearly four hours, a near-riot broke out in the scramble to get on the buses that finally did show up.

Col. Henry Whitehorn, head of state police, said authorities are working on establishing a temporary jail to hold people accused of looting and other crimes. "These individuals will not take control of the city of New Orleans," he said.

The first of hundreds of busloads of people evacuated from the Superdome arrived early Thursday at their new temporary home - another sports arena, the Houston Astrodome, 350 miles away.

But the ambulance service in charge of taking the sick and injured from the Superdome suspended flights after a shot was reported fired at a military helicopter. Richard Zuschlag, chief of Acadian Ambulance, said it was too dangerous for his pilots.

The military, which was overseeing the removal of the able-bodied by buses, continued the ground evacuation without interruption, said National Guard Lt. Col. Pete Schneider. The government had no immediate confirmation of whether a military helicopter was fired on.

Terry Ebbert, head of the city's emergency operations, warned that the slow evacuation at the Superdome had become an "incredibly explosive situation," and he bitterly complained that FEMA was not offering enough help.

"This is a national emergency. This is a national disgrace," he said. "FEMA has been here three days, yet there is no command and control. We can send massive amounts of aid to tsunami victims, but we can't bail out the city of New Orleans."

In Texas, the governor's office said Texas has agreed to take in an additional 25,000 refugees from Katrina and plans to house them in San Antonio, though exactly where has not been determined.
... continued in next post...

Esperante

09-01-2005, 02:36 PM

In Washington, the White House said President Bush will tour the devastated Gulf Coast region on Friday and has asked his father and former President Clinton to lead a private fund-raising campaign for victims.

The president urged a crackdown on the lawlessness.

"I think there ought to be zero tolerance of people breaking the law during an emergency such as this - whether it be looting, or price gouging at the gasoline pump, or taking advantage of charitable giving or insurance fraud," Bush said. "And I've made that clear to our attorney general. The citizens ought to be working together."

On Wednesday, Mayor Ray Nagin offered the most startling estimate yet of the magnitude of the disaster: Asked how many people died in New Orleans, he said: "Minimum, hundreds. Most likely, thousands." The death toll has already reached at least 126 in Mississippi.

If the estimate proves correct, it would make Katrina the worst natural disaster in the United States since at least the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and fire, which was blamed for anywhere from about 500 to 6,000 deaths. Katrina would also be the nation's deadliest hurricane since 1900, when a storm in Galveston, Texas, killed between 6,000 and 12,000 people.

Nagin called for a total evacuation of New Orleans, saying the city had become uninhabitable for the 50,000 to 100,000 who remained behind after the city of nearly a half-million people was ordered cleared out over the weekend.

The mayor said that it will be two or three months before the city is functioning again and that people would not be allowed back into their homes for at least a month or two.

"We need an effort of 9-11 proportions," former New Orleans Mayor Marc Morial, now president of the Urban League, said on NBC's "Today" show.

"A great American city is fighting for its life," he added. "We must rebuild New Orleans, the city that gave us jazz, and music, and multiculturalism."

Lt. Gov. Mitch Landrieu toured the stricken areas said rescued people begged him to pass information to their families. His pocket was full of scraps of paper on which he had scribbled down their phone numbers.

When he got a working phone in the early morning hours Thursday, he contacted a woman whose father had been rescued and told her: "Your daddy's alive, and he said to tell you he loves you."

"She just started crying. She said, `I thought he was dead,'" he said.

---

Esperante

09-01-2005, 02:40 PM

these people are already complaining and bitching about this when we're doing out best to rescue them, f*cking ingrates, its only been what, 2-3 days? we're doing our best

F*cking ingrates? So those people who are staying longer than told by the city with no food, water or safe shelter and who were unable to evacuate due to the city's lack of a bus evac. are f*cking ingrates?

Matt

09-01-2005, 02:43 PM

*steps on soap box*
The previous page or so of comments are totally irrelevant to this thread and are downright disrespectful to the current happenings on the Gulf Coast.
*steps off soap box*

Now, to the subject at hand. I find the way the survivors are behaving to be inappropriate, disgusting and plain old embarassing. This is a civilized society. We don't shoot at the helicopters that are trying to help our fellow citizens. We don't shoot police officers that are trying to keep us from breaking the law during a time of crisis. We don't shoot soldiers who are trying to coordinate relief efforts. We don't attack doctors and nurses who are trying to bandage the wounded. Or rather, before this week, I thought this was all true and I thought this was a civilized society. I believe I was mistaken. It's obvious that the people who made up the real soul of New Orleans got out of city before Katrina came ashore.

If I were the police chief of New Orleans, my immediate policy on looters would be "shoot-to-kill". If you see someone carrying the following: tvs, microwaves, shoes, purses, football jerseys (basically anything non-food and non-necessity), shoot them in the head. Then, for the ones you can even bother to get to, place a toe-tag on them that says "LOOTER" and send them floating through the streets as a warning.

This may all seem harsh, but harsh circumstances require harsh reactions. The people who take advantage of a crisis situation with needless violence and thievery are the absolute scum of the earth. This world would be a better place without them. It's time for social cleansing.

Matt

09-01-2005, 02:44 PM

F*cking ingrates? So those people who are staying longer than told by the city with no food, water or safe shelter and who were unable to evacuate due to the city's lack of a bus evac. are f*cking ingrates?

The ones who are shooting at helicopters, shooting police officers, attacking nurses and doctors and looting are absolutely ingrates.

Esperante

09-01-2005, 03:02 PM

If I were the police chief of New Orleans, my immediate policy on looters would be "shoot-to-kill". If you see someone carrying the following: tvs, microwaves, shoes, purses, football jerseys (basically anything non-food and non-necessity), shoot them in the head. Then, for the ones you can even bother to get to, place a toe-tag on them that says "LOOTER" and send them floating through the streets as a warning.

This may all seem harsh, but harsh circumstances require harsh reactions. The people who take advantage of a crisis situation with needless violence and thievery are the absolute scum of the earth. This world would be a better place without them. It's time for social cleansing.
I think that's almost indecently harsh. I say Police carry hard pellet guns:guns that hurt a lot but won't leave you mortally wounded. if things escalate or persist you should pull out the harm bearing guns. I, too, find it disgusting for people to be takig advantage of this situation, but with a shoot and kill policy the looters won't be the only people dying. Remember, even the police are stealing TVs, now.

The ones who are shooting at helicopters, shooting police officers, attacking nurses and doctors and looting are absolutely ingrates.
Absolutely.

nota

09-01-2005, 03:15 PM

Now, to the subject at hand. I find the way the survivors are behaving to be inappropriate, disgusting and plain old embarassing.

This is a civilized society.

We don't shoot at the helicopters ... We don't shoot police officers .. We don't shoot soldiers ..

If I were the police chief of New Orleans, my immediate policy on looters would be "shoot-to-kill".

If you see someone carrying the following: tvs, microwaves, shoes, purses, football jerseys (basically anything non-food and non-necessity), shoot them in the head. Then, for the ones you can even bother to get to, place a toe-tag on them that says "LOOTER" and send them floating through the streets as a warning.

It's time for social cleansing.
embarrased 'civilized society' demands social cleansing :confused:

taz_rocks_miami

09-01-2005, 03:28 PM

Now, to the subject at hand. I find the way the survivors are behaving to be inappropriate, disgusting and plain old embarassing. This is a civilized society. We don't shoot at the helicopters that are trying to help our fellow citizens. We don't shoot police officers that are trying to keep us from breaking the law during a time of crisis. We don't shoot soldiers who are trying to coordinate relief efforts. We don't attack doctors and nurses who are trying to bandage the wounded. Or rather, before this week, I thought this was all true and I thought this was a civilized society. I believe I was mistaken. It's obvious that the people who made up the real soul of New Orleans got out of city before Katrina came ashore.

If I were the police chief of New Orleans, my immediate policy on looters would be "shoot-to-kill". If you see someone carrying the following: tvs, microwaves, shoes, purses, football jerseys (basically anything non-food and non-necessity), shoot them in the head. Then, for the ones you can even bother to get to, place a toe-tag on them that says "LOOTER" and send them floating through the streets as a warning.

This may all seem harsh, but harsh circumstances require harsh reactions. The people who take advantage of a crisis situation with needless violence and thievery are the absolute scum of the earth. This world would be a better place without them. It's time for social cleansing.

Basically what you're calling for Matt is a state of Marshal Law to be put in place. I generally would disagree with such drastic action, but considering the reports that New Orleans has turned into a lawless area so quickly, I agree with what you're saying. What really worries me are the reports that mention that gun stores have been looted and gangs are walking around with all sorts of weapons in plain view. An iron hand is gonna be needed to put things back in order. :(

my porsche

09-01-2005, 03:34 PM

new orleans has always been a pit, they NEED martial law

Matra et Alpine

09-01-2005, 03:37 PM

* If you see someone carrying the following: tvs, microwaves, shoes, purses, football jerseys (basically anything non-food and non-necessity), shoot them in the head.
So someone who found the only thing of theirs they still had was a portable radio gets shot for wanting to take a little bit of their previous life out of the city with them.

Sheez, Matt, innocent until proven guilty man !!!!

Clearly identified looters - eg people seen to break in and steal, maybe.

BUT even then, so what if they're looting. it might just be the only way they can find food/water to survive ?

Surely the protection of property shoudl NEVER come before life. That they pulled folks from searching for people to protect property is a terrible condemnation of priorities :(

Esperante

09-01-2005, 04:18 PM

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2005/09/01/national/01orleans.l.jpg

lithuanianmafia

09-01-2005, 04:27 PM

these people are already complaining and bitching about this when we're doing out best to rescue them, f*cking ingrates, its only been what, 2-3 days? we're doing our best

uhhhhh, no they're NOT. the US government has sent out I believe 20 or so search and rescue teams, each one being able to carry maybe 5 people. So, 100 or so ppl being moved at a time out of how many thousands???

I think it is f*ckin ridiculous how this situation has been handled. Ft. Bragg, which is less than 300 miles away from New Orleans, HAS NOT BEEN MOBILIZED!!! also, the last report I saw said that it would take a few days for any national troops to reach the city, yet they were able to mobilize a half-million man force to invade Afghanistan in a span of around 48 hours. it's truly sad

lithuanianmafia

09-01-2005, 04:29 PM

Troops to Quadruple New Orleans Police

http://us.news3.yimg.com/us.i2.yimg.com/p/ap/20050901/capt.laeg11109011730.hurricane_katrina_laeg111.jpg ?x=380&y=272&sig=DgqjdzpDkShNeNAmpAsLrg--

WASHINGTON - Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said Thursday that 1,400 National Guard troops per day are being sent in to control looting and lawlessness in New Orleans, quadrupling the regular police force in the city by the weekend.

Already, 2,800 National Guardsmen are in the city to help local police since Hurricane Katrina produced devastating floods in New Orleans, Chertoff said at a news conference with Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. Another 1,400 Guard troops and military police units are being added daily, he said.

"Security is a concern," Gonzales said. "It is a priority."

National Guard troops are controlled by the governors of individual states.

"We will be deploying into New Orleans a force the size of the New Orleans police department each day, every day, for the next three days. That is a remarkable movement of law enforcement capability into an area that clearly needs augmentation and reinforcement," Assistant Defense Secretary Paul McHale said.

The Guard troops in new Orleans are part of a contingent of 30,000 that the military expects to put on duty in the Gulf states as demands grow for more security and relief assistance.

Separately, Chertoff said the federal government has already committed some $2 billion for rescue and relief efforts, and he estimated that hundreds of thousands of people were displaced in several states.

"This will be a challenge in this country on a par with some of the great tragedies we've seen overseas," he said.

Chertoff said the Coast Guard has rescued 3,000 people from flood and hurricane-damaged areas but acknowledged that continued flooding in New Orleans has made the federal government's job unusually difficult.

Local law enforcement has rescued thousands more.

"We continue to search 24/7. We search by day we search by night," Chertoff said.

"As long as there is someone on roof waving flag were gong to be sending a helicopter out there to get them," he added.

Chertoff noted that pictures of New Orleans have shown that looting continues. The additional police presence is meant to "send an unambigious message that we will not tolerate lawlessness or violence" that interferes with the relief effort."

Chertoff said evacuation efforts from New Orleans' Superdome has been complicated by a continued influx of new refugees there. He said authorities hope to clear the stadium in 24 hours, although it could take longer.

taz_rocks_miami

09-01-2005, 04:30 PM

uhhhhh, no they're NOT. the US government has sent out I believe 20 or so search and rescue teams, each one being able to carry maybe 5 people. So, 100 or so ppl being moved at a time out of how many thousands???

I think it is f*ckin ridiculous how this situation has been handled. Ft. Bragg, which is less than 300 miles away from New Orleans, HAS NOT BEEN MOBILIZED!!! also, the last report I saw said that it would take a few days for any national troops to reach the city, yet they were able to mobilize a half-million man force to invade Afghanistan in a span of around 48 hours. it's truly sad

Lets calm down guys, I'm sure the President and the rest of the Federal Goverment are doing all they can to help.

lithuanianmafia

09-01-2005, 04:32 PM

Lets calm down guys, I'm sure the President and the rest of the Federal Goverment are doing all they can to help.
I'm just saying that alot more should be done to help

taz_rocks_miami

09-01-2005, 04:35 PM

I'm just saying that alot more should be done to help

I'm sure more will be done, the coordination and logistics of such a massive operation must be mind bogling. :)

lithuanianmafia

09-01-2005, 04:35 PM

Congress Sending $10.5B in Relief Aid

By DAVID ESPO, AP Special Correspondent

WASHINGTON - Congress rushed to provide a $10.5 billion down payment in relief aid for Gulf Coast victims of Hurricane Katrina on Thursday as President Bush ordered new action to minimize disruptions in the nation's energy supplies.

"Don't buy gas if you don't need it," he urged consumers already hit by sharply rising prices.

Amid lawlessness in flooded, chaotic New Orleans,
Homeland Security Secretary
Michael Chertoff announced plans to deploy 1,400 additional National Guard personnel each day for the next several days.

"Frankly, what we're doing is we are putting probably more than we need in order to send an unambiguous message that we will not tolerate lawlessness or violence or interference with the evacuation," he said.

Despite fresh pledges of help from Bush and other officials, there were stirrings of discontent from officials over the administration's response to the storm.

Katrina roared ashore on Monday, claiming lives and spreading destruction along the Gulf Coast. Breaks in New Orleans' levees left the city defenseless against disastrous flooding.

"This is a national emergency. This is a national disgrace," said Terry Ebbert, the head of emergency operations for New Orleans. He said it had taken too long to evacuate the Superdome, a sports complex that quickly became a squalid shelter for tens of thousands of storm refugees.

"FEMA has been here three days, yet there is no command and control," he said, referring to the
Federal Emergency Management Agency. "We can send massive amounts of aid to tsunami victims, but we can't bail out the city of New Orleans."

Bush, who intends to visit the devastated area on Friday, expressed sympathy with the victims. "I know this is an agonizing time. ... I ask their continued patience as recovery operations unfold," he said.

Congressional officials said $10 billion in relief aid would go to FEMA, the government's first-line defender in case of natural disasters. The remainder is ticketed for the
Pentagon, which has dispatched ships and other assistance to aid in the relief effort.

With the Republican-controlled Congress officially on vacation, top leaders said they would pass the relief measure without waiting for lawmakers to return to the Capitol. Instead, they announced the money would be cleared — by Friday — without the formality of a vote, as is often the case on non-controversial measures.

"America stood with New York in its time of need and we will stand with the people of the Gulf states now that they need us," said Sen. Charles Schumer (news, bio, voting record), D-N.Y.

Bush, too, referred to the destruction wrought in New York by the terror attacks of four years ago. "New Orleans is more devastated than New York was and just physically devastated, as is the coast of Mississippi," he said in an interview with ABC.

Republican Sen. Thad Cochran (news, bio, voting record), whose home state of Mississippi was hard-hit by the hurricane, said the $10 billion would be the first of at least three bills to help with relief and recovery.

"Over half a billion dollars a day is being spent by FEMA," said Cochran, who is chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee.

While Republican leaders jointly announced plans to rush the spending bill to the president for his signature, Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., expressed some misgivings over a longer-term rebuilding effort in a newspaper interview published during the day in his home state.

Asked in an interview with the Daily Herald, a suburban Chicago paper, whether it made sense to spend billions rebuilding a city that lies below sea level, he replied, "I don't know. That doesn't make sense to me."

While expressing sympathy with victims of the storm, he said there needs to be a second look at rebuilding efforts. "But you know we build Los Angeles and San Francisco on top of earthquake fissures and they rebuild, too. Stubbornness," he added in the interview, which occurred on Wednesday.

Hastert sought to clarify his comments during the day, issuing a statement that said, "It is important that when we rebuild this historic city that we consider the safety of the citizens first."

"I am not advocating that the city be abandoned or relocated," he said. "My comments about rebuilding the city were intended to reflect my sincere concern with how the city is rebuilt to ensure the future protection of its citizens."

Bush, meanwhile, kept to a schedule salted with meetings designed to project the image of a leader responding to a challenge.

In addition to his ABC interview, he announced he was asking his two immediate predecessors to head an appeal for public donations to help hurricane victims. The two men, his father, George H.W. Bush, and Bill Clinton, performed a similar role in the wake of the tsunami that struck nations along the Indian Ocean last year.

The president also conferred by telephone with congressional leaders and had lunch with
Federal Reserve chairman
Alan Greenspan for what aides said was a discussion of the hurricane's potential impact on the economy and the energy supply.

Talking to reporters, he said the administration was working to restore pipeline capacity to the Gulf Coast, and said he expects a "temporary disruption of gasoline."

"Steps we're taking will help address the problem of availability (of gasoline), but it's not going to solve it," he said. "Americans should be prudent in their use of energy over the course of the next few weeks. Don't buy gas if you don't need it."

Bush said he had directed Chertoff to temporarily lift a ban on the use of foreign ships for distributing oil and gas between U.S. ports. "There are currently not enough American ships" to handle the demand, he said.

Bernanke put the hurricane-related increase in gasoline prices at 65 cents a gallon, largely the result of refinery and pipeline shutdowns. "It could be high for a few weeks, it could be high for a few months," he said.

lithuanianmafia

09-01-2005, 04:45 PM

Louisiana wants 40,000 troops

BATON ROUGE, Louisiana - Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco said Thursday she has requested the mobilization of 40,000 National Guard troops to restore order and assist in relief efforts in hurricane-ravaged New Orleans.

She said that by Friday, 12,000 National Guard members will have arrived in Louisiana and that sheriff's deputies from as far away as Michigan are on the way.

"They have been issued an oath of office and now have arrest powers in the state of Louisiana," she said.

Blanco said she also has requisitioned hundreds of buses from state schools to get the evacuees out of the city.

The breach at New Orleans' 17th Street Canal is under repair, and engineers expect to close the front of the canal at Lake Pontchartrain by Thursday evening, said Walter Baumy of the Army Corps of Engineers there.

http://www.cnn.com/interactive/weather/0508/map.new.orleans/images/new.orleans5.gif

There are accessibility problems with a second breach, he said.

Blanco described the project Wednesday as an "engineering nightmare."

State officials now say "thousands" of people have died in flooded New Orleans and its surrounding parishes, but no official count has been compiled, Blanco said.

Meanwhile, New Orleans' mayor, Ray Nagin, issued "a desperate SOS," saying that violence and lawlessness have overtaken the city, and hope is fading for the tens of thousands of starving survivors still stranded.

Sniper fire has prevented Charity Hospital from evacuating its patients. The hospital has no electricity or water, food consists of a few cans of vegetables, and the patients had to be moved to upper floors because of looters.

Meanwhile, Congress will return a few days early from its summer recess -- most likely Friday -- to begin work on legislation dealing with the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

Members are expected to pass by unanimous consent a $10 billion request to keep the Federal Emergency Management Agency operating as it tries to help the hundreds of thousands of victims of the killer storm. FEMA has enough money in its coffers for the short term, but will need billions more to deal with the fallout of the disaster.

Thursday afternoon, rain began to fall on the thousands of people gathered under an overhang at the city's convention center. A National Guard helicopter dropped MREs -- meals ready to eat -- and some water bottles.

Matt

09-01-2005, 06:18 PM

Basically what you're calling for Matt is a state of Marshal Law to be put in place. I generally would disagree with such drastic action, but considering the reports that New Orleans has turned into a lawless area so quickly, I agree with what you're saying. What really worries me are the reports that mention that gun stores have been looted and gangs are walking around with all sorts of weapons in plain view. An iron hand is gonna be needed to put things back in order. :(

Martial law has already been recommended by the mayor of New Orleans and is expected to go into effect after the second mandatory evacuation is completed.

Esperante

09-01-2005, 06:29 PM

Martial law has already been recommended by the mayor of New Orleans and is expected to go into effect after the second mandatory evacuation is completed.
If the second evacuation is completed, upon whom would martial law be enforced upon?

Another pic...
http://hosted.ap.org/photos/L/LADP14609020055-big.jpg

crisis

09-01-2005, 06:57 PM

With regards to the rescue and support efforts you would have to aknowledge that waiting to see what happened has cost valuable days in organising a response. Given the storm hit with less force than first anticipated I would have thought it would have made sense to have the medical and food ships and support on standby for immediate deployment. Likewise the National Guard. This was not going to be a picnic and having organised an excessive response would have been much more preferable to having to wait all this time.
My condolences to all affected.
We had a storm here that night , 140kmh winds, and I was worried a palm tree was going to fall on my house. It didnt. :o

lithuanianmafia

09-01-2005, 07:09 PM

Fats Domino Found in New Orleans

http://us.news3.yimg.com/us.i2.yimg.com/p/eo/20050902/capt.a865f268a5c9b04fad2ac15cbb371f0a.jpg?x=130&y=170&sig=A5lWGS9EOgdvnJlMuZVRug--

One of rock 'n' roll's chief architects has been rescued from the rubble of New Orleans.

Fats Domino, who had been unaccounted for in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, was plucked from the flooded city by a rescue boat.

His daughter, Karen Domino White, who lives in New Jersey, identified her father in a picture taken Monday night by a New Orleans Times-Picayune photographer. The singer is seen being helped from a boat by an emergency crew.

There was no word on where he was taken. There was also no word on the whereabouts of family members that had been with him before the storm hit.

An APB went out for the musician and his family soon after the levees broke and flooded his neighborhood in the city's 9th Ward, an area that is now littered with dead bodies.

The musician's niece, Checquoline Davis, posted a plea on Craigslist.com for information on her missing relatives, writing that Domino and his wife, Rosemary, and their children and grandchildren "didn't get out" of their New Orleans home. Her plea was one of thousands seeking information on missing friends and family on the site.

The R&B legend had last been heard from on Sunday night, a day before the storm struck. During a phone call with longtime agent Al Embry, the 77-year-old performer insisted he would ride out the hurricane in his three-story home.

The singer and boogie-woogie pianist, born Antoine Domino, has sold over 110 million records in his nearly five-decade career highlighted by the jukebox staples "Blueberry Hill" and "Ain't That a Shame." The New Orleans music fixture's 1949 recording of "The Fat Man" is considered by some to be the first rock 'n' roll record, and Domino was among the inaugural group of inductees into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1986.

Another Hall of Famer, singer-songwriter
Allen Toussaint, was listed among the missing, although Fox News reported that Toussaint may be among the 20,000-plus refugees seeking shelter in the Super Dome.

With New Orleans a hub of jazz, blues and even rap, several musicians were impacted by the storm. Rapper Juvenile's home was destroyed and he says he has lost several friends. Soul Asylum frontman Dave Pirner, who was waiting out the storm in his native Minneapolis, told the Associated Press he still hadn't heard anything about the condition of his home and recording studio in the Crescent City. Pirner moved there seven years ago.

Meanwhile, several high-powered denizens are rallying support. Master P, whose home was swamped and who hasn't been able to track down his uncle, father-in-law or sister-in-law, has announced the formation of a charity, Team Rescue, and is organizing a "Save Our Hood" concert and benefit album. Wynton Marsalis will play both NBC and BET's telethons in the coming days. Louisiana natives
Tim McGraw and
Harry Connick Jr. will also perform at the NBC event and have made public appeals for help.

"I haven't slept in days," Connick says in a statement. "Although I now finally know that my immediate family in New Orleans is safe, I have not heard from many, many friends and other family members.

"New Orleans is my essence, my soul, my muse, and I can only dream that one day she will recapture her glory. I will do everything within my power to make that happen and to help in any way I can to ease the suffering of my city, my people!"

Matt

09-01-2005, 08:11 PM

If the second evacuation is completed, upon whom would martial law be enforced upon?

Another pic...

Good question. I assume those they were not able to make leave and those who are going to try to return.

CSL

09-01-2005, 08:19 PM

google earth is starting to put pictures of the disaster into the program

IBrake4Rainbows

09-01-2005, 08:41 PM

It's the danger of living in a place which can be hit by tropical storms, and is below sea level.

I'd NEVER live in a place below sea level, although my House in Wellington was only 8 or so metres above it, it's still a handy buffer to have come flooding time.

I was watching a news broadcast and the looting is terrible. I can understand Shoes (SO you don't step in stuff under the water) and food supplies, maybe a radio so you can hear emergency broadcasts, but then you see the people tucking TV's into their trolley. Thats just crap to say it's helping them cope.

This is a disaster that requires more time and effort than Bush or Congress seems to be directing towards it. $150 Billion for the Military and $10.5 Billion for a destroyed city on the mainland of the United States. Kind of puts things into perspective spending wise......

crisis

09-01-2005, 09:32 PM

I took the liberty of splitting the thread and putting the Bush/politics part elswhere under "More Bush/Fleet vs the rest" to avoid offending anyone. :)

henk4

09-02-2005, 12:45 AM

inappropriate, disgusting and plain old embarassing. This is a civilized society. We don't shoot at the helicopters that are trying to help our fellow citizens. We don't shoot police officers that are trying to keep us from breaking the law during a time of crisis. We don't shoot soldiers who are trying to coordinate relief efforts.

but apparently WE do and why? Could it be that it is because WE all have guns? Is this the consequence of the first amendment? Has this amendment resulted in the USA being a civilised society? Apparently the laws of the jungle reign supreme as soon as such a disaster strikes. I also could not help noting that almost all people still trying to get saved are black, which to me would indicate that the white part of the population had the means to escape and many members of the black community just had to sit it out and had no wheels to take them (or be taken) elsewhere. This may also have something to do with the fact that about 35 mln Americans are living below the official poverty level a concentration of which might be found in the black quarters in southern cities.

Matt

09-02-2005, 08:51 AM

but apparently WE do and why? Could it be that it is because WE all have guns? Is this the consequence of the first amendment? Has this amendment resulted in the USA being a civilised society? Apparently the laws of the jungle reign supreme as soon as such a disaster strikes. I also could not help noting that almost all people still trying to get saved are black, which to me would indicate that the white part of the population had the means to escape and many members of the black community just had to sit it out and had no wheels to take them (or be taken) elsewhere. This may also have something to do with the fact that about 35 mln Americans are living below the official poverty level a concentration of which might be found in the black quarters in southern cities.
The majority of southern states and cities, including New Orleans, has a higher percentage of African-Americans in their population. Also, and please don't take this as a racist comment, the vast majority of people who make up the poverty-stricken population in the US is black. It's a sad fact. And the population of New Orleans is 40-50 poverty-stricken.

henk4

09-02-2005, 08:58 AM

The majority of southern states and cities, including New Orleans, has a higher percentage of African-Americans in their population. Also, and please don't take this as a racist comment, the vast majority of people who make up the poverty-stricken population in the US is black. It's a sad fact. And the population of New Orleans is 40-50 poverty-stricken.

That is what I assumed. Watching the news as I write: The police is using snipers to protect the rescue people....

Matt

09-02-2005, 09:11 AM

That is what I assumed. Watching the news as I write: The police is using snipers to protect the rescue people....

I totally support them in doing this, although it's sad that they have to.

henk4

09-02-2005, 10:11 AM

I totally support them in doing this, although it's sad that they have to.

I just stated the fact, it is really a sad state that your country has come to.

henk4

09-02-2005, 10:30 AM

just seen GWB declaring on TV that the bright side of the disaster will be that that a shining new Gulf city will be constructed:
Speechless....

Matt

09-02-2005, 02:12 PM

I just stated the fact, it is really a sad state that your country has come to.

I wouldn't say it's a sad state that our country has come to. It's a sad situation for the people down there. And it's absolutely pathetic that people have responded the way they have. Sure, the response has been slow. Sure, the conditions have been appaling. But, that's still no reason to act like animals. That's no reason for the violence. It's senseless. It's making the situation worse. And it certainly doesn't garner any sympathy from me. Now, the mayor of New Orleans yelling at Bush through the camera, saying he's pissed off and that Bush needs to get his ass down there garners sympathy from me. Seeing decent people calmly pleading and explaining the situation and standing properly in lines and not stealing and not beating and not raping people garners sympathy. The rest of them make me want to leave them to rot.

Esperante

09-02-2005, 02:15 PM

The flooding has been cut down by 2 feet, flowing back out through the breached levees. It's expected to continue once the low tide comes. :

National Guardsmen Arrive in New Orleans

By ALLEN G. BREED
Associated Press Writer

NEW ORLEANS (AP) -- More than four days after Hurricane Katrina struck, the National Guard arrived in force Friday with food, water and weapons, churning through the floodwaters in a vast truck convoy that was met with both catcalls and cries of "Thank you, Jesus!" from the suffering multitudes.

"Lord, I thank you for getting us out of here," Leschia Radford said at the New Orleans Convention Center as the military rolled in with orders to restore order and feed the hungry.

But 46-year-old Michael Levy said, "They should have been here days ago. I ain't glad to see 'em" - words that brought shouts of "Hell, yeah!" from those around him. He added: "We've been sleeping on the ... ground like rats. I say burn this whole ... city down."

The arrival of the thousands of soldiers came amid blistering complaints from the mayor and others that the federal government had bungled the relief effort and let people die in the streets for lack of food, water or medicine. Thousands are feared dead in New Orleans.

The people of our city are holding on by a thread," Mayor Ray Nagin warned in a statement to CNN. "Time has run out. Can we survive another night? And who can we depend on? Only God knows."

In Washington, President Bush admitted "the results are not acceptable" and pledged to bolster the relief efforts. He visited the stricken Gulf Coast later in the day, and pledged in Mobile, Ala.: "What is not working right, we're going to make it right."

With a cigar-chomping general in the convoy's lead vehicle, the camouflage-green National Guard trucks rolled through muddy water up to their axles to reach the convention center, where 15,000 to 20,000 desperate and often seething refugees had taken shelter. It was the first major relief convoy to reach the convention center.

Authorities set up six food and water lines, with dozens of armed guards keeping watch. The crowd was for the most part orderly and grateful to finally have a meal.

Diane Sylvester, 49, was the first person through the line, and she emerged with two bottles of water and a pork rib meal. "Something is better than nothing," she said as she mopped sweat from her brow. "I feel great to see the military here. I know I'm saved."

Guardsmen carrying rifles also arrived at the Louisiana Superdome, where a vast crowd of bedraggled people fanned themselves, waiting to rescued from the heat, the filth and the gagging stench inside the stadium.

Flatbed trucks carried huge crates, pallets and bags of relief supplies, including Meals Ready to Eat. Soldiers in fatigues sat in the backs of open-top trucks, their rifles pointing skyward.

Both the Superdome and the convention center had seemed like powder kegs in recent days: Fistfights and fires broke out, storm victims complained that the government had forsaken them, and furious evacuees menaced police.

The military said its first priority was delivering food and water, after which it would begin evacuating people - something that could take days.

"As fast as we can, we'll move them out," said Army Lt. Gen. Russel Honore. "Worse things have happened to America," he added. "We're going to overcome this, too. It's not our fault. The storm came and flooded the city."

New Orleans Police Superintendent Eddie Compass rode down the street on the running board of a box truck and announced through a bullhorn to thunderous applause: "We got 30,000 people out of the Superdome and we're going to take care of you."

"We've got food and water on the way. We've got medical attention on the way. We're going to get you out of here safely. We're going to get all of you," he said.

As he came down the road, elderly people gave thanks and some nearly fainted with joy. Compass also warned that if anyone did anything disruptive, the troops would have to stop distributing the food and water and get out.

Lt. Gen. Steven Blum, chief of National Guard, said that by Saturday night, there will be 7,000 National Guard soldiers in New Orleans. He said half of them had just returned from assignments overseas and are "highly proficient in the use of lethal force." He pledged to put down the violence "in a quick and efficient manner."

"The cavalry is and will continue to arrive," he said.

Earlier Friday, an explosion at a warehouse rocked a wide area of New Orleans before daybreak and jolted residents awake, lighting up the sky and sending a pillar of acrid gray smoke over a ruined city awash in perhaps thousands of corpses. A second large fire erupted downtown in an old retail building in a dry section of Canal Street.

There were no immediate reports of injuries. But the fires deepened the sense of total collapse in the city since Katrina slammed ashore Monday morning.

The National Guard arrived in force after law and order had all but broken down.

Over the past few days, police officers turned in their badges. Rescuers, law officers and medical-evacuation helicopters were shot at by storm victims. Fistfights and fires broke out at the Superdome as thousands of people waited in misery to board buses for the Houston Astrodome. Corpses lay out in the open in wheelchairs and in bedsheets. The looting continued, and the police chief said even officers were breaking into stores for food and water.

"Our officers have been urinating and defecating in the basement of Harrah's Casino," Compass said. "They have been going in stores to feed themselves."

City officials have accused the government - namely the Federal Emergency Management Agency - of responding sluggishly.

"Get off your asses and let's do something," the mayor told WWL-AM Thursday night in a rambling interview in which he cursed, yelled and ultimately burst into tears. At one point he said: "Excuse my French - everybody in America - but I am pissed."

Michael Brown, director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, said FEMA just learned about the situation at the convention center Thursday and scrambled to provide food, water and medical care and remove the corpses.

Some of New Orleans' hospitals, facing dwindling supplies of food, water and medicine, resumed evacuations Friday. Rescuers finally made it into Charity Hospital, the largest public hospital and trauma center in the city, where gunfire thwarted efforts on Thursday to evacuate more than 250 patients.

"We moved all of the babies out of Charity this morning," said Keith Simon, spokesman for Acadian Ambulance Service.

While the floodwaters in New Orleans appeared to stabilize, efforts continued to plug three breaches in the levees that protect this bowl-shaped, below-sea-level city, which is wedged between Lake Pontchartrain and the Mississippi River.

Helicopters dropped sandbags into the breach and pilings were being pounded into the mouth of the canal Thursday to close its connection to the lake.

Lt. Gen. Carl Strock, commander of the Army Corps of Engineers, said engineers are developing a plan to create new breaches in the levees so that a combination of pumping and the effects of gravity will drain the water out of the city. Removing the floodwaters will take weeks, he said.

---

my porsche

09-02-2005, 02:16 PM

its not the sad state our COUNTRY has come to its the sad state of new orleans, its always been a pit, always will be a pit, im not a racist, but most of the people left there are black druggies. every one smart or semi-smart evacuated when told to do so, and that is why the people left are shooting at the cops with the guns they stole, its a very sad thing that this is how they are acting in such a time :(

Matt

09-02-2005, 02:16 PM

but apparently WE do and why? Could it be that it is because WE all have guns? Is this the consequence of the first amendment? Has this amendment resulted in the USA being a civilised society? Apparently the laws of the jungle reign supreme as soon as such a disaster strikes. I also could not help noting that almost all people still trying to get saved are black, which to me would indicate that the white part of the population had the means to escape and many members of the black community just had to sit it out and had no wheels to take them (or be taken) elsewhere. This may also have something to do with the fact that about 35 mln Americans are living below the official poverty level a concentration of which might be found in the black quarters in southern cities.

The guns aren't making people act like idiots. Selfishness, a lack of a sense of community, ignorance, immaturity, lack of compassion and disrespect of the law is what is making the city plunge into chaos. Apparently, many of the "roaming gangs" are carrying boards, sticks, hammers and other weapons as well. I'm not defending the right to hold arms in any way. I agree that it was maybe the biggest mistake our founding fathers made. But, I certainly don't blame gun laws (or lackthereof) for the situation in NOLA.

taz_rocks_miami

09-02-2005, 03:27 PM

The guns aren't making people act like idiots. Selfishness, a lack of a sense of community, ignorance, immaturity, lack of compassion and disrespect of the law is what is making the city plunge into chaos. Apparently, many of the "roaming gangs" are carrying boards, sticks, hammers and other weapons as well. I'm not defending the right to hold arms in any way. I agree that it was maybe the biggest mistake our founding fathers made. But, I certainly don't blame gun laws (or lackthereof) for the situation in NOLA.

Gun laws have very little to do with the violence in New Orleans, it's been reported that local gun shops have been looted by the very gangs that are looting, raping and killing people. These gangs are made up of "scum" that are taking advantage of the situation. Criminals will always find a way to get their filthy hands on weapons. It these "people" that should be dealt with harshly by the National Guard.

I do defend the right to hold arms (Taz the liberal, imagine that!!) because decent people don't partake in these kinds of criminal activities. But scum will always find a way, no matter what laws we have in place. :(

lithuanianmafia

09-02-2005, 04:08 PM

Bush Admits Katrina Response 'Not Enough'

By JENNIFER LOVEN, Associated Press Writer

NEW ORLEANS - Scorched by criticism about sluggish federal help,
President Bush acknowledged the government's failure to stop lawlessness and help desperate people in New Orleans. "The results are not enough," Bush said Friday in the face of mounting complaints from Republicans and Democrats alike.

Bush promised to crack down on crime and violence, rush food and medicine to the needy and restore electrical power within weeks to millions of customers across the Gulf Coast in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

"This is a storm that requires immediate action, now," the president said after a daylong tour of Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana. "I understand the devastation requires more than one day's attention. It's going to require the attention of this country for a long period of time."

Congress passed a $10.5 billion disaster aid package, and Bush said he would sign it by day's end. He also said National Guard troops were moving in to restore order in New Orleans. He said the city's convention center, where thousands of people lived for days in unsafe conditions, was secure.

Inspecting Gulf Coast disaster scenes from the air and on the ground, Bush said the damage was "worse than imaginable." He consoled weeping women and praised Coast Guard teams that pulled stranded people from the roofs of flooded homes. In New Orleans, Bush flew by helicopter to the ruptured 17th Street levee and watched workers load huge sandbags that were airlifted and dropped into the breach.

"The president is starting to grasp the magnitude of the situation," said Sen. Mary Landrieu (news, bio, voting record), D-La. Sen. Trent Lott (news, bio, voting record), R-Miss., said, "The president obviously was just stunned" by what he saw.

Four days after Katrina killed hundreds if not thousands, Republicans joined Democrats in wondering why it was taking so long to relieve the misery of so many people living in squalor without the necessities of life.

"If we can't respond faster than this to an event we saw coming across the Gulf for days, then why do we think we're prepared to respond to a nuclear or biological attack?" asked former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, a Republican.

Republican Gov. Mitt Romney of Massachusetts called the government's response "an embarrassment."

Rep. Mark Foley (news, bio, voting record), R-Fla., called upon Bush to recall National Guardsmen stationed in
Iraq whose homes and families were in the path of Katrina's destruction. The president said there were enough Guard troops for Iraq and recovery efforts.

The storm of criticism was stinging for a president who won widespread praise for his handling of the terrorist attacks four years ago. It was an unwelcome turn for Bush, suffering sagging approval ratings in the polls.

While Bush has been loath to admit errors throughout his presidency, he conceded that the recovery is not proceeding well. Some White House aides and Republicans were glad to hear the president stop defending the administration's response when it was so obvious that conditions were so bad for so many people.

"Where it's not working right, we're going to make it right," the president said after walking through a devastated neighborhood of Mobile, Ala. "Where it is working right, we're going to duplicate it elsewhere."

Bush faulted efforts to restore order in New Orleans, where looting, violence and other crimes have been rampant. Asked what he meant by unacceptable results, Bush said, "Well, I'm talking about the fact that we don't have enough security in New Orleans yet." He said 1,200 National Guard troops arrived there on Friday and that 1,200 were deployed on Thursday.

"They need to stabilize that situation," the president said. "They need to make sure that the food and medicine that is in place is given to the people that need the food and medicine."

He said he was not faulting efforts in Mississippi, where Republican Gov. Haley Barbour praised federal help. Still, Barbour said, "We've suffered a grievous blow that we won't recover from for a long while"

Just a day earlier, New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin had lashed out at federal officials: "They don't have a clue what's going on down here."

There were calls from Republicans for Bush to name a prominent official to oversee the recovery. Gingrich suggested former New York
Mayor Rudolph Giuliani. Rep. John Sweeney (news, bio, voting record), R-N.Y., suggested Giuliani, former Secretary of State
Colin Powell or retired Gen. Tommy Franks to take charge.

In Biloxi, Miss., Bush comforted two weeping women on a street where a house had collapsed and towering trees were stripped of their branches. "My son needs clothes," said Bronwynne Bassier, 23, clutching several trash bags. "I don't have anything."

"I understand that," Bush said. He kissed both women on their heads and walked with his arms around them, telling them they could get help from the Salvation Army. "Hang in there," he said.

Asked later how the richest country on Earth could not meet the needs of its people, Bush said: "I am satisfied with the response. I am not satisfied with all the results."

Secretary of State
Condoleezza Rice said she would fly to her native Alabama on Sunday to view the destruction there. She acknowledged that the trip is an unusual one for the nation's top diplomat.

"I'm an American and I'm a Southern American," she told reporters. "I just hope I can be a little bit of an extension for a president who cares deeply about what's going on in the Gulf region but can't be everywhere."

Rice, the administration's highest-ranking black, dismissed criticism from black leaders who were angry about what they said was a slow federal response to a disaster affecting mostly poor people.

Although she agreed that the black community has been heavily affected, Rice said "nobody wants to see Americans suffer, and I think everybody understands that."

The White House announced Bush had approved federal disaster aid for Texas and Arkansas, which also sustained hurricane damage. Bush urged people to donate money to the Red Cross and Salvation Army.

nota

09-02-2005, 05:15 PM

By JENNIFER LOVEN, Associated Press Writer

The storm of criticism was stinging for a president who won widespread praise for his handling of the terrorist attacks four years ago.

Really? :rolleyes:

Rockefella

09-02-2005, 05:43 PM

Was anybody just watching NBC (Around 8:42 pm Eastern Time), and heard what Kanye West said? I quote, "..stutters.. and, and, Black people are looting but when white people are doing it, it's called finding food" and then after Mike Meyers spoke out for 10 seconds, West came back to say, "Bush hates black people." Kanye sounded like a nervous boy speaking in front of an audience of teachers, and sounded so incredibly racist you'd think he was part of an African-American KKK.

What a ----ing moron, he deserves to get slapped across the face. Mike Meyers looked over at him after he said it and they cut him off mid-sentence, throwing the program to Chris Tucker.

Matt

09-02-2005, 05:48 PM

Niko_Fx

09-02-2005, 05:59 PM

Rockefella

09-02-2005, 06:02 PM

Hard to expect anything decent from Kanye West, he's a friggin asswipe.

I don't care what the color of the people out there is, shooting like animals and stealing the unnecessary is ridiculous. The rapper should get a clue.
Good point. These people were told to evacuate, or at least, to cooperate with forces. They go and shoot at convoys, police, and innocent civilians, then cuss-out the government for not helping. I don't mean to sound racist, but 90% of the behavior, maybe more is from blacks. If I saw Kanye West in person, I would knock him out.

Matra et Alpine

09-02-2005, 06:08 PM

Good point. These people were told to evacuate, or at least, to cooperate with forces. They go and shoot at convoys, police, and innocent civilians, then cuss-out the government for not helping. I don't mean to sound racist, but 90% of the behavior, maybe more is from blacks. If I saw Kanye West in person, I would knock him out.
I tihk thats too harsh a generalisation rocke.

I dont' think it's the same people who are doing all of those things.

Unless you're classing by colour or race ?? :(

my porsche

09-02-2005, 06:09 PM

what a ****ing retard i hope he goes to NO and drowns (horrible to say)

so white people couldnt say this:

n*ggas eat fried chicken and watermellon and have afros and are poor

but black people can blame us fro everything and call us cracker etc.

anyone else find this odd?

Rockefella

09-02-2005, 06:10 PM

I tihk thats too harsh a generalisation rocke.

I dont' think it's the same people who are doing all of those things.

Unless you're classing by colour or race ?? :(
Sure, it sounds harsh.... but it's the f'n truth. Nearly everyone down there is of African-American or Caribbean descent, and they're the source of most of the trouble. The truth hurts sometimes Matra. I know I'll get flamed for it, but I don't like to lie about my opinion.

Matra et Alpine

09-02-2005, 06:20 PM

Sure, it sounds harsh.... but it's the f'n truth. Nearly everyone down there is of African-American or Caribbean descent, and they're the source of most of the trouble. The truth hurts sometimes Matra. I know I'll get flamed for it, but I don't like to lie about my opinion.
so you think if New York were to be hit by a tsunami all those guys woudl be pleasant.

I cant' remember who the quote was from but basically no matter how "civilised or educated" we thing we are we are all only a few days away from anarchy if we have no water or food. Survival is still the strongest instinct.

I'm not talkign about the idiots who are shooting at emergency services, busses etc. BUT grouping all the folks who would be scavenging for food with those stupid enough to think a stolen microwave has any vaue is a bit odd, no ? I dont think it helpful to group inidividuals liek thatand especially to align them all with the worst element. Whoever Kanye is , he may have had that sentiment, but COULD have voiced it better :(

It's already been suggested that the poor black population likely didn't have the measn to evacuate their families and so by definitino most folsk left are poor and black. There IS an element there who are causing major problems. How does it mean all shodul be labelled ?

my porsche

09-02-2005, 06:24 PM

I tihk thats too harsh a generalisation rocke.

no, its not, NO is a pit, its full of crime, most of the people left are drug addicts

Matra et Alpine

09-02-2005, 06:35 PM

no, its not, NO is a pit, its full of crime, most of the people left are drug addicts
wow now THAT is gotta be as bad as Kanye's words :(

HOW do you know they are ALL drug addicts ?
20,000 inside the Superdome are druggies ?? Doesnt' sound like all of them are from http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4207944.stm

I'm shocked at the ease with which you've grouped ALL of them because of the fact that they share the area and the skin colour of a minority causing trouble :(

Having visited New Orleans and walked around OUTSIDE of the tourist areas I've already commented on what I felt of the people of the city and Louisiana.

Matt

09-02-2005, 06:47 PM

no, its not, NO is a pit, its full of crime, most of the people left are drug addicts

Any major city has parts of the city like that. You're talking about the French Quarter. The French Quarter is a bad part of the city, especially at night. But, you get outside of that and go the Garden District or down by the university and it's a wonderful city.

I barely felt unsafe in New Orleans and that was only at night in the FQ. If you've been to any other major city, it's like that. San Francisco, Seattle, New York, Chicago, Dallas. In fact, of all those cities I actually felt the least safe in Seattle.

my porsche

09-02-2005, 06:58 PM

wow now THAT is gotta be as bad as Kanye's words :(

HOW do you know they are ALL drug addicts ?
20,000 inside the Superdome are druggies ?? Doesnt' sound like all of them are from http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4207944.stm

I'm shocked at the ease with which you've grouped ALL of them because of the fact that they share the area and the skin colour of a minority causing trouble :(

Having visited New Orleans and walked around OUTSIDE of the tourist areas I've already commented on what I felt of the people of the city and Louisiana.
who said "ALL"? look at my un-edited post, it says most

even the mayor said it im pretty sure

most of the city s that way anyway, but then the non high ones got out of there

Esperante

09-02-2005, 08:40 PM

Hey, my_Porsche, I bet you didn't know that Washington DC is arguably the most dangerous city in the US.

Rockefella

09-02-2005, 08:44 PM

so you think if New York were to be hit by a tsunami all those guys woudl be pleasant.

I cant' remember who the quote was from but basically no matter how "civilised or educated" we thing we are we are all only a few days away from anarchy if we have no water or food. Survival is still the strongest instinct.

I'm not talkign about the idiots who are shooting at emergency services, busses etc. BUT grouping all the folks who would be scavenging for food with those stupid enough to think a stolen microwave has any vaue is a bit odd, no ? I dont think it helpful to group inidividuals liek thatand especially to align them all with the worst element. Whoever Kanye is , he may have had that sentiment, but COULD have voiced it better :(

It's already been suggested that the poor black population likely didn't have the measn to evacuate their families and so by definitino most folsk left are poor and black. There IS an element there who are causing major problems. How does it mean all shodul be labelled ?
I was referring mainly to the groups of criminals and looters who are taking supplies unnecessary for survival, like televisions and the such. Those making desperate attempts at surviving by taking food/water don't apply to what I said.

henk4

09-03-2005, 12:37 AM

A Dutch reporter yesterday commented that this disaster will have a profound influence on the inter-racial relations in the USA. Reading all the comments above, I think the first traces are already visible.

Matra et Alpine

09-03-2005, 01:59 AM

who said "ALL"? look at my un-edited post, it says most

even the mayor said it im pretty sure

most of the city s that way anyway, but then the non high ones got out of there
I enjoy nit-picking in a debate.

MOST means majority. So I would contend that the bias I was highlighting is still valid and whilst saying 'all' in response to your words was inaccurate it was more accurate by orders of magnitude than your supposition that a few became 'most'.

You KNOW what I meant and I was trying through investigation find out what YOU felt. I think I know now. Cheers.

Matra et Alpine

09-03-2005, 02:03 AM

I was referring mainly to the groups of criminals and looters who are taking supplies unnecessary for survival, like televisions and the such. Those making desperate attempts at surviving by taking food/water don't apply to what I said.
no probs, Rocke.

My concern was the ease with which "shoot looters on site" had fallen to the lips of officialdom and the media. As stated earlier, you cant' tell the difference between someone carrying a microwave box with food in it STOLEN for survival and someone carrying a microwave box with a microwave in it stolen for some perverse plan to profit by. Except for the racists who would undoubtedly say if they're black then theyre degenerate druggies and it must be looting, if they're white they must be clean cut all american and they're needing it to survive :(

Could it be possible THAT is where Kanye's intent would have come from - though as already said, he should have thought about the wording better.

lithuanianmafia

09-03-2005, 06:26 AM

it's kinda funny, CNN is now advertising that if you need to know how to get help, go their website. Yes folks, if you have somehow managed to restore power and your phone lines, go to cnn.com!

lithuanianmafia

09-03-2005, 06:30 AM

Guardsmen Halt Evacuation at Superdome
By MARY FOSTER, Associated Press Writer

http://us.news3.yimg.com/us.i2.yimg.com/p/ap/20050903/capt.ladm13609030103.hurricane_katrina_ladm136.jpg ?x=262&y=345&sig=JSr2s1gOgfUewM4v7ejXaQ--

NEW ORLEANS - Buses taking Hurricane Katrina victims far from the squalor of the Superdome stopped rolling early Saturday. About 2,000 people remained in the stadium and could be there until Sunday, according to the Texas Air National Guard.

Officials had hoped to evacuate the last of the crowd before dawn Saturday. Guard members said they were told only that the buses had stopped coming and to shut down the area where the vehicles were being loaded.

"We were rolling," Capt. Jean Clark said. "If the buses had kept coming, we would have this whole place cleaned out already or pretty close to it."

Those left behind early Saturday were orderly, sitting down after hearing news that evacuations were temporarily stalled.

Guard members reported that the massive evacuation operation for the most part had gone smoothly Friday, coming after days of uncertainty, violence and despair.

Capt. John Pollard of the Texas Air Force National Guard said 20,000 people were in the dome when evacuation efforts began. That number swelled as people poured into the Superdome because they believed it was the best place to get a ride out of town.

Tina Miller, 47, had no shoes and cried with relief and exhaustion as she left the Superdome and walked toward a bus. "I never thought I'd make it. Oh, God, I thought I'd die in there. I've never been through anything this awful."

The arena's second-story concourse looked like a dump, with more than a foot of trash except in the occasional area where people were working to keep things as tidy as possible.

Bathrooms had no lights, making people afraid to enter, and the stench from backed-up toilets inside killed any inclination toward bravery.

"When we have to go to the bathroom we just get a box. That's all you can do now," said Sandra Jones of eastern New Orleans.

Her newborn baby was running a fever, and all the small children in her area had rashes, she said.

"This was the worst night of my life. We were really scared. We're getting no help. I know the military police are trying. But they're outnumbered," Jones said.

At one point Friday, the evacuation was interrupted briefly when school buses pulled up so some 700 guests and employees from the Hyatt Hotel could move to the head of the evacuation line — much to the amazement of those who had been crammed in the Superdome since last Sunday.

"How does this work? They (are) clean, they are dry, they get out ahead of us?" exclaimed Howard Blue, 22, who tried to get in their line. The National Guard blocked him as other guardsmen helped the well-dressed guests with their luggage.

The 700 had been trapped in the hotel, near the Superdome, but conditions were considerably cleaner, even without running water, than the unsanitary crush inside the dome. The Hyatt was severely damaged by the storm. Every pane of glass on the riverside wall was blown out.

Mayor Ray Nagin has used the hotel as a base since it sits across the street from city hall, and there were reports the hotel was cleared with priority to make room for police, firefighters and other officials.

Conditions in the Superdome remained unbearable even as the crowd shrank after buses ferried thousands to Houston a day earlier. Much of the medical staff that had been working in the "special needs" arena had been evacuated.

Dr. Kenneth Stephens Sr., head of the medical operations, said he was told they would be moved to help in other medical areas.

Those who wanted food were waiting in line for hours to get it, said Becky Larue, of Des Moines, Iowa.

Larue and her husband arrived in the area last week for a vacation but their hotel soon told them they had to leave and directed them to the Superdome. No directions were provided, she said.

"I'm really scared. I think people are going into a survival mode. I look for people to start injuring themselves just to get out of here," she said.

Larue said she was down to her last blood pressure pill and had no idea of when they'll get out or where to get help.

James LeFlere, 56, was trying to remain optimistic.

"They're going to get us out of here. It's just hard to hang on at this point," he said.

Janice Singleton, a worker at the Superdome, said she got stuck in the stadium when the storm hit. She said she was robbed of everything she had with her, including her shoes.

"They tore that dome apart," she said sadly. "They tore it down. They taking everything out of there they can take."

Then she said, "I don't want to go to no Astrodome. I've been domed almost to death."

taz_rocks_miami

09-03-2005, 11:31 AM

It's sad to see how this tragedy has brought out the worst in SOME people. Apart from all the looting, shootings and rapes that have been reported. CNN interviewed some pretty pissed off cops, why are they pissed off? According to them, 1/3 of the police force in New Orleans desserted after Katrina. I don't know whether to be angry or just plain sad. :(

my porsche

09-03-2005, 11:38 AM

be angry and sad this i just ridiculous :mad:

Esperante

09-03-2005, 12:13 PM

shr0olvl

09-03-2005, 12:16 PM

'George Bush doesnt care about black people'.

What an idiotic statement, Kanye.

R34GTR

09-03-2005, 12:20 PM

Probably said in the heat of the moment, but still unacceptable I've got both Kanye's CD's now and he's simply one of the best Rn'B/Hip Hop artist out there with very smart lyrics this doesn't reflect that, Bush has promised more help to Louisana and New Orleans so that might calm him down :D

my porsche

09-03-2005, 12:31 PM

ive always thought he was an idiot, on punk'd (hate that show) he kept running around with his shirt collar flipped up saying "ive got to be in paree! ive got to be in paree" (paris) i jst dont like him very uch

GW Doesnt like black people. hahaha

6'bore

09-03-2005, 01:58 PM

Floating off topic but Kanye West is one of the best talents in hip-hop. Ever.

There was a quote in the paper today of what the Mayor of New Orleans had said....

"Excuse my French, but I'm pissed. Get every bus in the country and get the f*** over to New Orleans."

Matra et Alpine

09-03-2005, 05:31 PM

Just listened to radio interview with AMerican Red Cross representative.

She said they have been ready to provide food, water, blankets and beds for those in the city and they HAVE BEEN STOPPED FROM ENTERING IT. The Red Cross are well recognised the world over for being able to DELIVER aid at the sharp end of the stick.

The 'leaders' in that city/state/nation need a hot poker inserted in an orifice QUICK :(

lithuanianmafia

09-03-2005, 06:58 PM

Carnival Sending Three Ships for Refugees

http://channels.netscape.com/fotosrch/3/20040918FLAN101.jpg

By TRAVIS REED Associated Press Writer

Federal officials are chartering three of Carnival Cruise Lines' ships for six months, part of a plan to provide shelter for as many as 7,000 people displaced by devastating Hurricane Katrina.

The three ships - the Ecstasy, Sensation and Holiday - will be pulled from regular use starting Monday.

Ecstasy, normally ported at Galveston for four-and five-day cruises, and Sensation, normally in New Orleans for similar trips, will both be pulled Monday and are scheduled to dock and house Katrina refugees in Galveston, Texas.

The Holiday, which normally sails four and five-day Mexico cruises out of Mobile, Ala., will be pulled Thursday and likely docked in Mobile.

Approximately 920 crew members will staff the 70,367 gross-ton Ecstasy and Sensation, with about 660 running the 46,052-ton Holiday. The Ecstasy and Sensation can each take 2,606 total passengers, while the Holiday can hold 1,800.

``We sincerely apologize to those guests whose vacations have been impacted by these voyage cancellations,'' Carnival CEO Bob Dickinson said in a news release. ``This inconvenience ... will provide desperately needed housing for thousands of individuals affected by this tragedy.''

Federal officials asked Carnival, the world's largest cruise line, shortly after Katrina slammed into the Gulf coast if their ships could be used as emergency shelters.

Carnival spokesman Vance Gulliksen said Saturday from Miami, where the corporation is based, that it does not disclose the price of charter contracts, and it's virtually impossible to tell precisely how many trips will be canceled.

``I can't put a number on it, but we are displacing people to accommodate the FEMA charter,'' he said. ``You're looking at tens of thousands.''

A FEMA spokeswoman did not immediately return a telephone message Saturday seeking comment.

All guests with canceled bookings will get full refunds and the opportunity to re-book on any Carnival ship with a $100-per-person shipboard credit.

Because of the deployments, The Elation, which operates seven-day cruises from Galveston, will offer a one-time six-day voyage departing Sept. 4, then take over the Ecstasy's four and five-day Galveston program starting next Saturday. Guests will receive a 15 percent refund and a $50-per-person shipboard credit. The ship's five-day cruise, scheduled to leave Monday, has been canceled.

lithuanianmafia

09-03-2005, 07:02 PM

Probably anticipating that the US would reject anything Cuban, Fidel offered 1000 doctors and 30 tonnes of medical equipment.
.......
In Kanye West's words...
'I hate the way they portray us in the media. You see a black family, it says, "They're looting." You see a white family, it says, "They're looking for food." And, you know, it's been five days because most of the people are black. And even for me to complain about it, I would be a hypocrite because I've tried to turn away from the TV because it's too hard to watch. I've even been shopping before even giving a donation, so now I'm calling my business manager right now to see what is the biggest amount I can give, and just to imagine if I was down there, and those are my people down there. So anybody out there that wants to do anything that we can help -- with the way America is set up to help the poor, the black people, the less well-off, as slow as possible. I mean, the Red Cross is doing everything they can. We already realize a lot of people that could help are at war right now, fighting another way -- and they've given them permission to go down and shoot us! George Bush doesn't care about black people!'
it's sad to say, but some of what Kanye West said is true, although he maybe didn't say it the right way. when I was watchin CNN today, they did exactly what West said was goin on...a black family came out with food and called them looters, but called a white family doin the exact same thing "searching for food". Whether we like to believe it or not, there is still alot of racism in this world, and even in this discussion. Media sterotypes certainly haven't helped, and how the mass media is portraying the people in New Orleans is only making it worse

taz_rocks_miami

09-03-2005, 07:10 PM

Probably anticipating that the US would reject anything Cuban, Fidel offered 1000 doctors and 30 tonnes of medical equipment.

It would be a major mistake and unfair to the victims to turn this into a political event. Who cares if aid comes from Cuba or Venezuela for that matter. Venezuela has offered to send an entire rescue brigade.

This tragedy is so big that it would be a huge diservice to the victims to refuse help from anyware. Throw politics out the window for now and think of the people!!
.......

In Kanye West's words...
'I hate the way they portray us in the media. You see a black family, it says, "They're looting." You see a white family, it says, "They're looking for food." And, you know, it's been five days because most of the people are black. And even for me to complain about it, I would be a hypocrite because I've tried to turn away from the TV because it's too hard to watch. I've even been shopping before even giving a donation, so now I'm calling my business manager right now to see what is the biggest amount I can give, and just to imagine if I was down there, and those are my people down there. So anybody out there that wants to do anything that we can help -- with the way America is set up to help the poor, the black people, the less well-off, as slow as possible. I mean, the Red Cross is doing everything they can. We already realize a lot of people that could help are at war right now, fighting another way -- and they've given them permission to go down and shoot us! George Bush doesn't care about black people!'

It's not just Kayne West, Jessie Jackson, Al Sharpton and even African American legislators are raising the issue of racism. While I'm not convinced that the help was late becuase of racism, the lack of planning and poor responce times have made it seem like that to many people.

lithuanianmafia

09-03-2005, 07:14 PM

It would be a major mistake and unfair to the victims to turn this into a political event. Who cares if aid comes from Cuba or Venezuela for that matter. Venezuela has offered to send an entire rescue brigade.

This tragedy is so big that it would be a huge diservice to the victims to refuse help from anyware. Throw politics out the window for now and think of the people!!

couldn't have said it better myself

CSL

09-03-2005, 07:43 PM

It's not just Kayne West, Jessie Jackson, Al Sharpton and even African American legislators are raising the issue of racism. While I'm not convinced that the help was late becuase of racism, the lack of planning and poor responce times have made it seem like that to many people.

Well id say it might seem like that if the mayor wasant black himself

This had been expected for years, it was always a matter of when instead of if.

1 year and 2 months ago a disaster drill was doen in New Orleans for this exact type of event and it was concluded that people should have enough supplys to last a few days because there would be only so much the governemnt could do early on

Blame the news media for the slow reaction because they were making the hurricane out to be nothing more, it wasant untill tuesday and the levee break hat shit really hit the fan.

taz_rocks_miami

09-03-2005, 08:01 PM

Well id say it might seem like that if the mayor wasant black himself

This had been expected for years, it was always a matter of when instead of if.

1 year and 2 months ago a disaster drill was doen in New Orleans for this exact type of event and it was concluded that people should have enough supplys to last a few days because there would be only so much the governemnt could do early on

I agree the responce time could have been much, much faster. I think it was slow due to incompetence more than anything else. Not that it's a good thing or even an excuse, but I doubt it was becuase of ill will on the part of anyone.

Blame the news media for the slow reaction because they were making the hurricane out to be nothing more, it wasant untill tuesday and the levee break hat shit really hit the fan.

It's becuase of the news media that people learned about Katrina and had enough info on it that allowed them to see the seriousness of the situation and thus took the desition (those who could) to leave the city on time. It's the lack of coordination between FEMA and other agencies that should be blamed, not the media.

my porsche

09-03-2005, 08:55 PM

great now we are going to give these people viruses from the cruise ships?!?! great idea! :p

taz_rocks_miami

09-03-2005, 09:26 PM

great now we are going to give these people viruses from the cruise ships?!?! great idea! :p

What??!!

lithuanianmafia

09-03-2005, 09:43 PM

great now we are going to give these people viruses from the cruise ships?!?! great idea! :p
yeah man, WTF?

lithuanianmafia

09-03-2005, 09:55 PM

Some more pictures from the devestation:

http://www.flickr.com/images/spaceball.gif

This one was written in a bathroom stall:

http://static.flickr.com/21/39596688_4a07c1cf03.jpg?v=0

http://us.news3.yimg.com/us.i2.yimg.com/p/ap/20050904/capt.ladm14809040207.hurricane_katrina_ladm148.jpg ?x=380&y=253&sig=ZUhVYqqKyQJ887YZmxuVLw--

http://us.news3.yimg.com/us.i2.yimg.com/p/ap/20050901/capt.msrs10109010001.hurricane_katrina_mspi_msrs10 1.jpg?x=380&y=238&sig=YbZQ4yzMC5yIYkbzLX42Fw--

Esperante

09-04-2005, 07:44 AM

great now we are going to give these people viruses from the cruise ships?!?! great idea! :p
I would prefer getting a virus from a clean cruise ship than getting sick/shot/beaten/electricuted/attacked/starved/poisoned in the streets of New Orleans.

Matra et Alpine

09-04-2005, 11:49 AM

Kanye West's TV comments are up at http://www.big-boys.com/articles/kanye.html

Chris Rock is certainly more flummoxed than I've ever seen him befroe !!!!

my porsche

09-04-2005, 11:51 AM

yeah me too :D

at least one person got my joke :(

shr0olvl

09-04-2005, 01:57 PM

my porsche

09-04-2005, 02:02 PM

taz_rocks_miami

09-04-2005, 02:25 PM

yeah he showed me that before he posted it, IT IS THE TRUTH!!! us two, plus a few less regular posters are the houston members, THIS IS WHAT IS HAPPENING, no matter how much you'd like to believe that these people (90% of them) have any gratefulness for what our city is doing (letting all the refugess in, and sending busses for them, ~700,000 so far) you'd be wrong, they don't, they just bitch because they get a coach bus with a broken bathroom, its a ****ing 5 hour drive, get over it.

they complain about everyhting, maybe if they (~60%) got off their ass and got a job they could afford to buy better than what is offered, and jason's deli, for anyone who hasnt had it, is pretty damn good so i don't see what there is to complain about

my vent for the day, from a person's veiw who is ACTUALLY WHERE IT IS HAPPENING. :)

How do you know 60% of them don't have a job Colin? New Orleans is (ok was) a city with very few well paid jobs, most people (that 60% you're talking about) had minimum wage jobs, that would explain why so many couldn't afford to get out in the first place. Now just imagine, on top of that, they all lost what little they had, most didn't get any help for 4 to 6 days. This is the USA not a third world country, they have every right to have expected a quicker and better responce.

CSL

09-04-2005, 02:44 PM

How do you know 60% of them don't have a job Colin? New Orleans is (ok was) a city with very few well paid jobs, most people (that 60% you're talking about) had minimum wage jobs, that would explain why so many couldn't afford to get out in the first place. Now just imagine, on top of that, they all lost what little they had, most didn't get any help for 4 to 6 days. This is the USA not a third world country, they have every right to have expected a quicker and better responce.

well most disasters dont have the stupid citizens shooting at the rescuers

taz_rocks_miami

09-04-2005, 02:52 PM

well most disasters dont have the stupid citizens shooting at the rescuers

Your point is??? The ones that are shooting, looiting and raping are criminal scum gone wild. Nothing to do with the decent (and poor) citizens that are demanding a better quality of help.

Rockefella

09-04-2005, 03:06 PM

Your point is??? The ones that are shooting, looiting and raping are criminal scum gone wild. Nothing to do with the decent (and poor) citizens that are demanding a better quality of help.
I agree with both of you, somewhat. From most of the reports I heard (not media), these people were ungrateful, rude, and beligerent. On the other hand, these people lost their homes, their memories, the great city of New Orleans, their jobs, family members, and were not helped for 4-5 days. While they were TOLD, and almost FORCED to evacuate, I can understand how some living in poverty couldn't afford to evacuate.

In summation, these people are more than likely acting like selfish bastards, but there's a motive behind it.

my porsche

09-04-2005, 03:37 PM

sorry i was just a little pissed at the time of writing, but the truth is new orleans really isnt all its cracked up to be, sad to say but true :(

Matra et Alpine

09-04-2005, 04:30 PM

The Truth.

http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.view&friendID=22714973&blogID=45938031&Mytoken=20050903210145

cliff notes: The people are unthankful and assholes about getting help, but you should still read it.
interseting read and standpoint.

I felt "a quietstorm" added some balancing insight to "maher"s comments.

Yes it's terrible that they weren't saying thank you.

BUT to anyone who has experienced death up close and lived through it it doesnt' necessarily leave you in a nice place :( so perhaps the posters expectations of the peoples response was invalid to start with and hence created a reticular-activation for the negativity they saw. THese folks are suffering post-traumatic shock - have you ever seen a well-educated soldier suffering from it ? rationality, civility and responsibility disappear very quickly :(

AND FINALLY, there IS no excuse for bad manners but there can sometimes be reasons. Soem of it will be the drug adicts and criminals that are in ALL cities and may be the ones left were that element. I hate to see New Orleans and Lousianians ( ? ) labelled because of the possibly worst 10% in the small sample that was in the city when it hit. The same percentages probably exists in all cities !!

crisis

09-04-2005, 06:29 PM

it's sad to say, but some of what Kanye West said is true, although he maybe didn't say it the right way. when I was watchin CNN today, they did exactly what West said was goin on...a black family came out with food and called them looters, but called a white family doin the exact same thing "searching for food". Whether we like to believe it or not, there is still alot of racism in this world, and even in this discussion. Media sterotypes certainly haven't helped, and how the mass media is portraying the people in New Orleans is only making it worse
I saw a report yesterday that showed two photos. One of a black witht the caption "looting", the other with two white people who had just found some supplies. Apparently the captions were later changed. Bush was interviewed elswhere and asked if he understod why some people were taking water and food from shops for survival. He responded he though their should be zero tolerance. This in view of the statement from the mayor that the troops were trained to shoot to kill.
When I first heard that there were racial overtones to this I thought, oh not again. The consiracy theorists are at work. But the dynamics of the situation were explained on a special I saw on Sunday morning. The evacuation of the city resulted in all of those who wanted to and could leave, moving to safety. What this meant was that the poor, those with no money or transportation, were left behind. I belive this was a terrible mistake by the city. Surely they should have made arrangement for the poor and those unable to secure transportation to leave also be it by bus , train or whatever.
The authorities have dug themselves a big hole here.
On top of this we here Bush give a vacuous speech about how "we will rebuild New Orleans" as though this is supposed to be of sme comfort to those still stuck there. :rolleyes:

Matra et Alpine

09-04-2005, 06:33 PM

Surely they should have made arrangement for the poor and those unable to secure transportation to leave also be it by bus , train or whatever.
The authorities have dug themselves a big hole here
FEMA has consumed VAST amounts of government money over the years and is supposed to be the co-ordinating body whenever there is a natinoal emergency :(

I've seen a suggestion that since "homeland security" became the major issue, that FEMA isn't as effective.

Will there be a public inquiry to identify the failings to ensure they're not repeated or does that stay behind closed doors ???? Obviosuly not immediately as helping THESE people is more important than ensugin the next tiem is better.

CSL

09-04-2005, 06:40 PM

Your point is??? The ones that are shooting, looiting and raping are criminal scum gone wild. Nothing to do with the decent (and poor) citizens that are demanding a better quality of help.

what do you think my point is? lets send regular cops in who have also lost everything and expect them to take these people out? They had to wait for a overwhelming force to move in to make the streets safe for the rescuers to move in and out of

Esperante

09-05-2005, 06:25 AM

I saw a report yesterday that showed two photos. One of a black witht the caption "looting", the other with two white people who had just found some supplies.

I saw that too. I come across it again, I'll post it up. The thing is, however, that the two different captions came from two different new sources. With looting such a debatable thing now, I don't think racism plays any part in what two different media companies think.

Searching for the lost
New Orleans begins grisly cleanup, counting of the dead
Journal Sentinel wire services
Posted: Sept. 4, 2005
New Orleans - New Orleans turned much of its attention Sunday to gathering up and counting the dead across a ghastly landscape awash in perhaps thousands of corpses.

It is going to be about as ugly of a scene as I think you can imagine," Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said.

"I think it's evident it's in the thousands," Health and Human Services Secretary Michael Leavitt said of the number of bodies.

As authorities struggled to keep order, police shot eight people, killing five or six, after gunmen opened fire on a group of contractors traveling across a bridge on their way to make repairs, authorities said.

Air and boat crews searched flooded neighborhoods for survivors, and federal officials urged those still left in New Orleans to leave for their own safety.

To expedite the rescues, the Coast Guard requested through the media that anyone stranded hang out brightly colored or white linens, or something else to draw attention. But with the electricity out though much of the city, it was not known if the message was being received.

With large-scale evacuations completed at the Superdome and convention center, the death toll was not known. But bodies were everywhere: floating in canals, slumped in wheelchairs, abandoned on highways and medians and hidden in attics.

"We need to prepare the country for what's coming," Chertoff said on "Fox News Sunday." "We are going to uncover people who died, maybe hiding in houses, got caught by the flood."

With his comments on CNN, Leavitt echoed predictions by city and state officials last week but became the first federal official to acknowledge that the death toll is in the thousands.

The U.S. Public Health Service said one morgue alone, at a St. Gabriel prison, expected 1,000 to 2,000 bodies.

In the first official count in the New Orleans area, Louisiana emergency medical director Louis Cataldie said authorities had verified 59 deaths - 10 of them at the Superdome.

In Sunday's bridge confrontation, 14 contractors on their way to help plug the breech in the 17th St. Canal were traveling across the Danziger Bridge under police escort when they came under fire, said John Hall, a spokesman for the Army Corps of Engineers. Police shot at eight people carrying guns, killing five or six, Deputy Police Chief W.J. Riley said. None of the contractors was injured, authorities said.

Meanwhile, a civilian helicopter crashed Sunday evening near the bridge. The two people on board escaped with only cuts and scrapes, according to Mark Smith of the state Office of Emergency Preparedness.

Tensions still mounting
The strain was apparent in other ways. Aaron Broussard, president of Jefferson Parish, dropped his head and cried on NBC's "Meet the Press."

"It's not just Katrina that caused all these deaths in New Orleans," Broussard said. "Bureaucracy has committed murder here in the greater New Orleans area, and bureaucracy has to stand trial before Congress now."

Broussard said, "The guy who runs this building I'm in, emergency management, he's responsible for everything. His mother was trapped in St. Bernard nursing home, and every day she called him and said, 'Are you coming, son? Is somebody coming?' And he said, 'And yeah, Momma, somebody's coming to get you. Somebody's coming to get you on Tuesday. Somebody's coming to get you on Wednesday. Somebody's coming to get you Thursday. Somebody's coming to get you on Friday' - and she drowned Friday night. She drowned on Friday night."

"Nobody's coming to get her, nobody's coming to get her," Broussard said. "The secretary's promise, everybody's promise. They've had press conferences - I'm sick of the press conferences. For God's sakes, shut up and send us somebody."

Criticism continued from other quarters about the federal response to the emergency.

"It was too little, too late," Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.) told CNN. "The initial response was very slow, very inadequate, and it basically said from a planning standpoint that we missed the mark."

However, the beleaguered Mississippi Gulf Coast was getting some relief Sunday as supplies of food and water began to roll in and people gathered to pray, some on the concrete slabs that were all that remained of their churches.

The Bush administration also came under fire for its suggestion that the local and state response to the disaster was inadequate. "If one person criticizes them or says one more thing, including the president of the United States, he will hear from me," Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) said on ABC. "One more word about it after this show airs, and I might likely have to punch him. Literally."

President Bush was planning to return to the area today, three days after an initial visit, with appearances in Baton Rouge, La., and Poplarville, Miss.

Bush ordered flags flown at half-staff at all public buildings, military facilities, and embassies "as a mark of respect for the victims" until Sept. 20.

Flights to continue as needed
In Washington, D.C., Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta announced that more than 10,000 people had been flown out of New Orleans in what he called the largest airlift in history on U.S. soil. He said the flights would continue as long as needed.

The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, at the government's request, announced a hot line and Web site dedicated to reuniting family members separated by the storm. By 11 a.m. Milwaukee time today, people will be able to get help at (888) 544-5475 or at www.missingkids.com, where they can post or look through photographs, lists of names and physical descriptions.

In sections of New Orleans and more remote areas of Mississippi, the difficult door-to-door scouring in search of the dead and the living began Sunday, and it could take weeks, if not months.

"I would like to believe that we are on the back side of this tremendous hump," Air Force Maj. Gen. Marvin S. "Scott" Mayes, leader of the air component for the military task force operating in the hurricane-ravaged region, said Sunday. "But now comes the grunt work of the search and rescue, now we're getting to the hard part. It will go on for some time."

This story was compiled from reports by Associated Press, Cox News Service and Knight Ridder News Service

Esperante

09-05-2005, 05:08 PM

A Week After Storm, Levee Break Is Fixed

By DOUG SIMPSON
Associated Press Writer

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NEW ORLEANS, La. (AP) -- A week after Hurricane Katrina, engineers plugged the levee break that swamped much of the city and floodwaters began to recede, but along with the good news came the mayor's direst prediction yet: As many as 10,000 dead.

Louisiana officials said Monday afternoon that sheets of metal and repeated helicopter drops of 3,000-pound sandbags along the 17th Street canal leading to Lake Ponchartrain succeeded in plugging a 200-foot-wide gap, and water was being pumped from the canal back into the lake. Once the canal level is drawn down about two feet, Pumping Station 6 can start pumping water out of New Orleans on a limited capacity.

Some parts of the city showed slipping floodwaters as the repair neared completion, with the low-lying Ninth Ward dropping more more than a foot. In downtown New Orleans, some streets were merely wet rather than swamped.

"We're starting to make the kind of progress that I kind of expected earlier," New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin said even before the plug of the break, which opened up a day after the hurricane and flooded 80 percent of the city up to 20 feet deep.

The good news came as many of the 460,000 residents of suburban Jefferson Parish waited in a line of cars that stretched for miles to briefly see their flooded homes, and to scoop up soaked wedding pictures, baby shoes and other cherished mementoes.

"A lot of these people built these houses anticipating some flood water but nobody imagined this," sobbed Diane Dempsey, a 59-year-old retired Army lieutenant colonel who could get no closer than the water line a mile from her Metairie home. "I'm going to pay someone to get me back there, anything I have to do."

"I won't be getting inside today unless I get some scuba gear," added Jack Rabito, a 61-year-old bar owner who waited for a ride to visit his one-story home that had water lapping to the gutters.

Katharine Dastugue was overjoyed to find that floodwaters had gone across her lawn but stopped just inches from her doorstep. As she stood waiting for a boat to take her in, she made a list of things she hoped to salvage before being forced to leave again Wednesday.

"If I can just get my kids' baby photos," she said. "You can't replace those."

In New Orleans, Nagin upticked his estimate of the probable death toll in his city from merely thousands to telling NBC's "Today" show: "It wouldn't be unreasonable to have 10,000."

As law enforcement officers and even bands of private individuals - including actor Sean Penn - launched a door-to-door boat and air search of the city for survivors, they were running up against a familiar obstacle: People who had been trapped more than a week in damaged homes yet refused to leave.

"We have advised people that this city has been destroyed," said Deputy Police Chief W.J. Riley. "There is nothing here for them and no reason for them to stay, no food, no jobs, nothing."

Riley, who estimated fewer than 10,000 people were left in the city, said some simply did not want to leave their homes - while others were hanging back to engage in criminal activities, such as looting.

Nagin said the city had the authority to force residents to evacuate but didn't say if it was taking that step. He did, however, detail one heavy-handed tactic: Water will no longer be handed out to people who refuse to leave.

In another effort of "encouragement," a Louisiana State Police SWAT team, armed with rifles, confronted two brothers at their home in the Uptown section of New Orleans, leaving one sobbing.

"I thought they were going to shoot me," said 23-year-old Leonard Thomas, weeping on his front porch. "That dude came and stuck the gun dead at my head."

One officer, who did not give his name, said his team tried to make sure that the two men understood that food and water is becoming scarce and that disease could begin spreading.

Even though almost a third of New Orleans' police force was missing in action, a caravan of law enforcement vehicles, emblazoned with emblems from across the nation and blue lights flashing, poured into the city to help establish order on the city's anarchic streets and give police a much-deserved break.

Four hundred to 500 officers on New Orleans' 1600-member force were unaccounted for, police officials said. Some lost their homes. Some were looking for families. "Some simply left because they said they could not deal with the catastrophe," Riley said. Officials said officers were being cycled off duty and given five-day vacations in Las Vegas and Atlanta, where they would also receive counseling.

At a news conference, the leader of the National Guard effort declared the city was largely free of the lawlessness that plagued it in the days following the hurricane. And he angrily lashed out at a reporter who suggested search-and-rescue operations were being stymied by random gunfire and lawlessness.

"Go on the streets of New Orleans - it's secure," said Army Lt. Gen. Russel Honore. "Have you been to New Orleans? Did anybody accost you?"

Hopeful signs of recovery were accompanied by President Bush's second visit to Louisiana that exposed a continued rift between state and federal officials over the slowness of a relief effort. The first significant convoy of food, water and medicine didn't arrive in New Orleans until four full days after the hurricane, and the mayor and others said some survivors died awaiting relief.

The Times-Picayune, Louisiana's largest newspaper, published an open letter to Bush, called for the firing of every official at the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

At a stop in Baton Rouge, Bush said all levels of the government were doing their best, and he pledged again: "So long as any life is in danger, we've got work to do. Where it's not going right, we're going to make it right."

Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco has refused to sign over National Guard control to the federal government and has turned to a Clinton administration official, former Federal Emergency Management Agency chief James Lee Witt, to help run relief efforts.

Blanco, a Democrat, was not informed of the timing of Bush's visit, nor was she immediately invited to meet him or travel with him. In fact, Blanco's office didn't know when Bush was coming until told by reporters. As reporters saw the governor sitting on the runway for a flight to Houston to visit evacuees early Monday, her staff tracked down the details and her trip was rescheduled so that she could meet the president.

While the New Orleans refugees were mostly poor and black, Jefferson Parish brought the storm's destruction to a much wider economic cross-section. The sprawling parish stretches from Grand Isle on the Gulf of Mexico to Lake Pontchartrain in the north, and includes some of the metropolitan area's most exclusive neighborhoods.

In the enclave of Old Metairie, the rows of palatial, six-bedroom homes sustained little structural damage but had some of the worst flooding. Only a few windows were broken and the live oaks survived but the water rippled up the knobs at front doors and completely covered Mercedes-Benzes, pickup trucks and BMWs in garages.

Many residents were happy that the storm spared their homes, but angry that the failure of the levee system left them swamped. Some were considering a lawsuit against the federal government for having a levee that could survive no more than a Category 3 hurricane.

"That's what so devastating, that goddamned levee breaking," said Bobby Patrick, a resident of neighborhood now living in Houston. "My home didn't lose a shingle but it's got six feet of water in it."

Since the storm, rumors had swirled that looters had crossed over the parish line and begun breaking into evacuated homes in Jefferson. Many were relieved to return home Monday to find their belongings untouched.

Walter Zehner found his front yard full of foul-smelling floodwater and a broken lock on his door from rescuers looking for stranded survivors, but nothing missing. "It could have been a lot worse," he said.

Across the neighborhood, residents took what items they could fit in a boat. One woman loaded up her boat with her collection of cashmere sweaters, her cat and the 1957 Leica camera that belonged to her grandfather. A man packed his pickup truck with his silverware, his wife's clothes and a cherished animal figurine.

Unlike the poor in New Orleans, these refugees had other places to go. And few here planned to stay through what could be a long recovery.

With police checkpoints on every major street corner and ID checks for parish residents, even looting was not a major concern.

Said personal trainer Rod McClave: "I'm more concerned about them damaging my stuff just for the hell of it."

---

lithuanianmafia

09-05-2005, 05:13 PM

National Guard unit to return from Iraq to Katrina

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A National Guard unit based in New Orleans will return from the war in
Iraq on Saturday to deal with the devastation of Hurricane Katrina and the flood that followed, a spokeswoman said on Monday.

"We have got several hundred soldiers that are coming back from a year in combat to this," said Samantha Bingham, a spokeswoman for Fort Polk, an army base northwest of New Orleans.

"Many, many of them are from southern Louisiana," Bingham said in a telephone interview.

Several hundred members of the 2,800-strong 256th Army National Guard's 141st field artillery section are due to return early on Saturday morning, Bingham said.

"That unit was headquartered out of New Orleans," Bingham said.

The members of the unit will be given immediate four-day passes to give them time to figure out their situations, she said. They will then be given the option of demobilizing from active duty and going back to civilian life, Bingham said.

"They will also be given the option of going right back on active duty and serving as National Guard soldiers in the relief efforts," she said.

"The soldiers who lost their homes and their families are refugees, if they go back on active duty, they will be housed at Fort Polk." The rest will be the responsibility of the National Guard, she said.

Bingham said Fort Polk was busy setting up temporary housing in barracks for displaced members of the military and would find family housing for the long term.

lithuanianmafia

09-05-2005, 05:17 PM

Actor, pilot John Travolta delivers food, vaccines to Katrina victims

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METAIRIE, United States (AFP) - Actor John Travolta and his wife, actress Kelly Preston, flew in their own private jet to deliver five tons of food for victims of Hurricane Katrina.

Travolta, an experienced pilot, flew the supplies to Baton Rouge, Louisiana, then toured the flooded city of New Orleans and visited rescue workers and shelters for evacuees. The two movie stars also brought along 400 doses of tetanus vaccines for rescuers.

The star of "Saturday Night Fever" and "Pulp Fiction" told AFP he was coordinating with
Oprah Winfrey to get even more relief for the more than a million people affected by one of the worst storms in US history.

"That's our job today," he said. "We're hoping this time we're effective."

At the Jefferson Parish sheriff's command center, the two stars posed for pictures and thanked Church of Scientology volunteers administering tetanus shots to rescue workers. Both actors are Scientologists.

At one point, Travolta, 51, spoke quietly with Jefferson Parish Sheriff Harry Lee, then embraced him. Preston, 42, followed suit, with tears in her eyes.

"They've had such great loss," she said.

Travolta is the latest in a stream of sports, literary and entertainment celebrities to reach out to the victims of Katrina, the worst-ever storm to hit the United States.

Many have themselves been touched by the disaster. Rock and roll pioneer Fats Domino had to be rescued from his flooded New Orleans home.

Indianapolis Colts quarterback Peyton Manning and his brother Eli, of the New York Giants, were in Baton Rouge over the weekend distributing more than 14 kilograms (30,000 pounds) of emergency supplies, including diapers and bottled water. Their father, Archie Manning, was for many years the quarterback of the New Orleans Saints American football team.

Thriller writer John Grisham and his wife, Renee, who live in the stricken state of Mississippi, donated five million dollars to help relief efforts.

Others, such as Canadian diva Celine Dion, rapper Kanye West and crooner Harry Connick Jr, a New Orleans native, have been harshly critical of government responses to the disaster.

Travolta declined to join in the criticism, saying he had seen both good and bad.

"What we've seen in the shelters is wonderful, because people are being taken care of," he said. "What we've seen in the city is disastrous."

Esperante

09-05-2005, 05:23 PM

Did anyone hear about Sean Penn's silly attempt to rescue people? First he went out with a bad bilge, therefore causing the ship to take on water, and when he went into the city, people declined to go on because it was already overloaded with his posse. :p

Jack_Bauer

09-05-2005, 05:37 PM

An interesting article on the possible causes of Katrina. It is sensationalist no doubt, and to be honest I think it was a bit disrespectful to start trying to lay the blame at the feet of politicians/fuel companies/media etc while people were still dying in the streets. However I do think it is a thought-provoking perspective to put on the whole tragedy.

Katrina's real name
By Ross Gelbspan | August 30, 2005

THE HURRICANE that struck Louisiana yesterday was nicknamed Katrina by the National Weather Service. Its real name is global warming.
When the year began with a two-foot snowfall in Los Angeles, the cause was global warming.
When 124-mile-an-hour winds shut down nuclear plants in Scandinavia and cut power to hundreds of thousands of people in Ireland and the United Kingdom, the driver was global warming.
When a severe drought in the Midwest dropped water levels in the Missouri River to their lowest on record earlier this summer, the reason was global warming.
In July, when the worst drought on record triggered wildfires in Spain and Portugal and left water levels in France at their lowest in 30 years, the explanation was global warming.
When a lethal heat wave in Arizona kept temperatures above 110 degrees and killed more than 20 people in one week, the culprit was global warming.
And when the Indian city of Bombay (Mumbai) received 37 inches of rain in one day -- killing 1,000 people and disrupting the lives of 20 million others -- the villain was global warming.
As the atmosphere warms, it generates longer droughts, more-intense downpours, more-frequent heat waves, and more-severe storms.
Although Katrina began as a relatively small hurricane that glanced off south Florida, it was supercharged with extraordinary intensity by the relatively blistering sea surface temperatures in the Gulf of Mexico.
The consequences are as heartbreaking as they are terrifying.
Unfortunately, very few people in America know the real name of Hurricane Katrina because the coal and oil industries have spent millions of dollars to keep the public in doubt about the issue.
The reason is simple: To allow the climate to stabilize requires humanity to cut its use of coal and oil by 70 percent. That, of course, threatens the survival of one of the largest commercial enterprises in history.
In 1995, public utility hearings in Minnesota found that the coal industry had paid more than $1 million to four scientists who were public dissenters on global warming. And ExxonMobil has spent more than $13 million since 1998 on an anti-global warming public relations and lobbying campaign.
In 2000, big oil and big coal scored their biggest electoral victory yet when President George W. Bush was elected president -- and subsequently took suggestions from the industry for his climate and energy policies.
As the pace of climate change accelerates, many researchers fear we have already entered a period of irreversible runaway climate change.
Against this background, the ignorance of the American public about global warming stands out as an indictment of the US media.
When the US press has bothered to cover the subject of global warming, it has focused almost exclusively on its political and diplomatic aspects and not on what the warming is doing to our agriculture, water supplies, plant and animal life, public health, and weather.
For years, the fossil fuel industry has lobbied the media to accord the same weight to a handful of global warming skeptics that it accords the findings of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change -- more than 2,000 scientists from 100 countries reporting to the United Nations.
Today, with the science having become even more robust -- and the impacts as visible as the megastorm that covered much of the Gulf of Mexico -- the press bears a share of the guilt for our self-induced destruction with the oil and coal industries.
As a Bostonian, I am afraid that the coming winter will -- like last winter -- be unusually short and devastatingly severe. At the beginning of 2005, a deadly ice storm knocked out power to thousands of people in New England and dropped a record-setting 42.2 inches of snow on Boston.
The conventional name of the month was January. Its real name is global warming.
Ross Gelbspan is author of ''The Heat Is On" and ''Boiling Point."