Say what you want about my state. I’ve said some harsh things myself. But please remember this one thing. After all is said and done, Mississippians are on record as the most generous state in the Union.
Our need is tremendous. Everyone who can to give aid to the survivors of this devastating catastophe, please do so. We need some generosity and hospitality back. We need for the concerned people of the nation to ring the phones of their elected Federal representatives off the hook demanding that the federal government do MORE. That the Federal authorities claim that they waited for local authorities to ask them to help is a TRAVESTY. The Federal government and ONLY the Federal government has the necessary resources to respond to a disaster of this magnitude.
For ANYONE in government to claim that they did not anticipate the devastation is shameful. The last thing I posted here, before having to prepare to the exclusion of everything, was a disaster estimate from the TAOS simulation that I captured on Sunday, August 28, 2005, 8:46:23 AM. I found this damage estimate at http://hurricane.methaz.org/. By Friday, August 26, at 11 p.m. EDT, the National Hurricane Center forecast track predicted a near miss for New Orleans. By August 27, at 5 a.m. EDT, Katrina was a Category 3 hurricane with nothing but open, HOT water between it and New Orleans, and no upper-level shear to prevent runaway intensification. By early morning on the 27th, all of the major hurricane track forecasting models were all over and around New Orleans.
Where were the buses? Where is the airlift operation? Where are the aerial food and water “drops”? Where is the National Guard? For this ruthless and brutal mis-management, the whole ‘administration’ should be run out of town, hog-tied on rails.
If I could say it better than “tigity” on weatherunderground.com said it , I would:
Posted By: tigity at 7:54 PM GMT on August 31, 2005.
It is absolutely unexcusable that mandatory evacs were not put into place early saturday morning. The national guard should have been put in place shuttling people out of the area. The saddest part of this is that most loss of life and suffering that is going on right now could have been avoided. The forecasters and hurricane models were in good agreement saturday morning that the track and strength of katrina would very likely take it very close to New Orleans and the central gulf coast. The 24 hours they waited to put mandatory evacs in place likely cost many lives. Many that were left behind had no way to leave the city. If public officials Federal, state, and local would have had there act together the loss of life could have been much lower. For goodness sake there were commentators on all of the news channels warning that this would likely come to pass. Why did no one listen. There is a strong possiblilty that the loss of life from this disaster could be greater then Sept 11. I only hope that our goverment will learn from this mistake and put into place the same types of resources that have applied to the war on terror. Do you think if we knoew somone was going to run 2 airplanes into the twin towers 2 days in advance that officials would have just watched and waited for the aftermath. I sure hope not.[sic]
Now, look at this table, and
Imagine an area larger than any one of 40 American states totally wiped out. No infrastructure, no food, no water and no jobs. Please donate to the American Red Cross, or your favorite relief agency to help those affected by this disaster.
On a personal note, I and my family have suffered 76 hours with no electricity, a “boil water” order (still in effect), a 60 foot tree down in my backyard that crashed into and through my toolshed and knocked down 100 ft. of wooden fence and a beautiful 25 ft. tall and wide fig tree. We also lost two beautiful 25 ft. tall Crepe Myrtle trees. My second “land line” telephone is still down and I had no internet access for 80 hours, other than a couple of brief moments of wireless access at a local cafe that was lucky enough to not lose power.
My extended family and friends are all OK, though we have all suffered through similar inconveniences. The city of Jackson, MS had over 80% power outages (now down to about 50%) throughout the city and gas shortages that are curtailing travel to and from work for tens of thousands of citizens. Price-gouging is rampant, with gas prices as high as $6.39 per gallon. Police have commandeered gasoline at several stations around the city and outlying suburbs to ensure gasoline for emergency vehicles. The city of Jackson has absorbed at least thirty or forty thousand refugees by my “seat of the pants” estimate. The city suffered one death from a tree falling into a home. As bad as it seemed to me here during all of this, I know that the sum total of my aggravation is merely inconvenience when compared to what is going on further south. I have turned my attention to seeking out ways to help, but even though I am closer than most of you to the real disaster area, the emergency co-ordinators are asking us to stay home, stay off the roads, conserve gasoline, and let the governments and the NGO’s handle the situation. They are asking us to give money, and we are.
Some of you may have seen my recounting of my childhood experience of living through tornadoes. I can now say that I have heard “that sound” twice in my life. Though the most massive Category 1 forces passed fifty miles away from my home, the roar from Katrina was ever present. It sounded like a fleet of C-130’s in the distance ( a little further away than the tornadoes I survived, but still plenty scary). On top of that general roar, I could hear individual gusts as they approached my location. The gusts that surely reached 80+ mph in my considered estimation, sounded like an F-14 coming in for a landing, breaking into a loud rush of wind as each gust hit us with its full force.
If anyone compares this to Hurricane Camille in 1969, tell them they are full of shit. Camille was a pussycat compared to this massive, monstrous, hopped up on steroids, hurricane. Global Warming is real, and I have met it.
