Captain's Quarters Blog


« Katrina: More Race, No Class | Main | The Final NARN Show At The 2005 Fair »

September 4, 2005
Katrina: Dry Run Taught New Orleans Nothing

Marc from Cranial Cavity notes that the issues of evacuation had come to light before in New Orleans, almost exactly a year ago, in the advance of Hurrican Ivan through the Gulf. This report demonstrates that the problem experienced this week in The Big Easy did not arise from ignorance or a failure of imagination, but directly from incompetence in the city administration and specifically by Mayor Ray Nagin:

Those who had the money to flee Hurricane Ivan ran into hours-long traffic jams. Those too poor to leave the city had to find their own shelter - a policy that was eventually reversed, but only a few hours before the deadly storm struck land.

New Orleans dodged the knockout punch many feared from the hurricane, but the storm exposed what some say are significant flaws in the Big Easy's civil disaster plans.

Much of New Orleans is below sea level, kept dry by a system of pumps and levees. As Ivan charged through the Gulf of Mexico, more than a million people were urged to flee. Forecasters warned that a direct hit on the city could send torrents of Mississippi River backwash over the city's levees, creating a 20-foot-deep cesspool of human and industrial waste.

Residents with cars took to the highways. Others wondered what to do.

"They say evacuate, but they don't say how I'm supposed to do that," Latonya Hill, 57, said at the time. "If I can't walk it or get there on the bus, I don't go. I don't got a car. My daughter don't either."

Advocates for the poor were indignant.

"If the government asks people to evacuate, the government has some responsibility to provide an option for those people who can't evacuate and are at the whim of Mother Nature," said Joe Cook of the New Orleans ACLU.

Please note the date of this report: Septemer 19, 2004. Nagin and New Orleans knew these problems existed almost a year before Katrina hit and the levees failed. In fact, both Nagin and Kathleen Blanco noted the failure of the New Orleans effort to evacuate people from the city.

Nagin also provided a quote which showed that using the Superdome not only presented known difficulties, but that the city had previously avoided using it for those exact reasons (emphases mine):

In this case, city officials first said they would provide no shelter, then agreed that the state-owned Louisiana Superdome would open to those with special medical needs. Only Wednesday afternoon, with Ivan just hours away, did the city open the 20-story-high domed stadium to the public.

Mayor Ray Nagin's spokeswoman, Tanzie Jones, insisted that there was no reluctance at City Hall to open the Superdome, but said the evacuation was the top priority.

"Our main focus is to get the people out of the city," she said.

Callers to talk radio complained about the late decision to open up the dome, but the mayor said he would do nothing different.

"We did the compassionate thing by opening the shelter," Nagin said. "We wanted to make sure we didn't have a repeat performance of what happened before. We didn't want to see people cooped up in the Superdome for days."

Not only did Nagin know that the Superdome would prove inadequate for shelter for any period longer than a few hours, he encouraged people to gather there without providing the resources he knew that shelter to lack. Instead, he ran off to Baton Rouge despite his responsibility to oversee the execution of the emergency-response plans and ranted at Bush for not reacting quickly enough to the disaster.

And the Exempt Media, by and large, have covered for Nagin's incompetence. Does anyone seriously wonder why?

Sphere It Digg! View blog reactions
Posted by Ed Morrissey at September 4, 2005 9:49 AM

Trackback Pings

TrackBack URL for this entry is

Listed below are links to weblogs that reference Katrina: Dry Run Taught New Orleans Nothing:

» Mayor Nagin? You have some explaining to do! from Macmind - Conservative Commentary and Common Sense
Mayor Nagin and other critics of the recovery effort in New Orleans, might want to get their facts straight. The fact is if you must look at who to blame, you might want to look at the City of New Orleans itself. [Read More]

Tracked on September 4, 2005 12:32 PM

» Disastrous disaster response from local and state La. officials from Sister Toldjah
The facts coming out in the aftermath of the Hurricane Katrina devastation point more to gross incompetence on the part of local and state officials in La. The response was apparently so poorly coordinated, that the feds on Friday attempted to wrest a... [Read More]

Tracked on September 4, 2005 1:22 PM

» Caught On Camera: New Orleans PD Looting from Independent Sources
This photo and caption are not out of context. Click on the link below to see the police being interviewed while looting. Their insolent audacity is remarkable. When the mayor of New Orleans had said that police had more important things to do than ... [Read More]

Tracked on September 4, 2005 2:14 PM

» Katrina Blogging Round-up from bRight & Early
Above all, Katrina is still an event that should have our hearts, minds, prayers, thoughts, and efforts focused on those effected by the storm's distruction. bRight & Early is recomending the American Red Cross. Of course they are just one of lit... [Read More]

Tracked on September 4, 2005 4:47 PM

» Introspective Analysis from Publius Rendezvous
On a warm September morning four very short years ago, Americans were left with a broken heart and did not know what lay in store for us as we moved to pick up the pieces and pursue a course of action. Yet, we resoundingly met the challenge with our ... [Read More]

Tracked on September 4, 2005 9:46 PM

» It Wasn't The Feds Who Murdered Hurricane Victims from Hard Starboard
....It was the state of Louisiana and especially the "goddamn" mayor of New Orleans, Ray Nagin. Cap'n Ed, in his inimitable. yeoman fashion, has the round-up. *Katrina: Dry Run Taught New Orleans Nothing Marc from Cranial Cavity notes that... [Read More]

Tracked on September 4, 2005 10:11 PM

» LOUISIANA POLS BLAME BUSH; NO MIRRORS FOUND IN HOU from FATASS THE CONQUEROR
Over at Michelle Malkin, Junkyard Blog writer Bryan Preston lays the SMACKDOWN on local pols. While the mayor makes a very good psychic, he makes a very poor leader in a time of crisis!! [Read More]

Tracked on September 5, 2005 3:44 AM

» Fool me twice from The Bad Hedgehog
Shame on him From the Captain's Quarters blog. The disaster in New Orleans can be blamed directly on its incompetent Mayor, RAY NAGIN, who repeated the SAME mistakes he made one year ago:Marc from Cranial Cavity notes that the issues [Read More]

Tracked on September 5, 2005 9:18 AM

» We Think An Investigation Is Nessisary from SoCalPundit
Indeed someone messed up and as a result, thousands were put in peril and many may have died. Although Democrats and their minions in the media have been quick to call for an investigation, they may not like what that investigation ultimately finds. ... [Read More]

Tracked on September 5, 2005 1:29 PM

» Local Responsibility from Dean's World

Local officials everywhere need to read about New Orleans' failures.

Because in a disaster, those "at the top" are not in Washington DC. They're th...

[Read More]

Tracked on September 6, 2005 1:20 PM



Design & Skinning by:
m2 web studios





blog advertising



button1.jpg

Proud Ex-Pat Member of the Bear Flag League!