ECN Forum Forums General Topics of the Trade General Discussion Area New Orleans (NO Politics)

I think it is a little unfair to blame the feds too much for being slow. The "army" is constitutionally prevented from going in and declaring martial law. The National Guard works for the governor of the state, not the feds. Those guys are just citizen soldiers
and they just went through a hurricane themselves.

The rest of the gulf coast had a hurricane and the response was reasonable under the circumstances.
NOLA was a different type of disaster that nobody was really ready for. You can probably blame the "social engineering" and the fact that there were as many people with no personal resources in that "bowl" as any civil engineering failure.
Most of us would have swam, walked or crawled up to the first place that took Visa and got the hell out of there. These folks were just stuck with no where to go and no way to get there.

BTW where were the Coast Guard BOATS? Helicopters are probably the least efficient way to evacuate people from a flood.
Personally I think they left those people there because they ran out of places to put them. Also, why send them all to Houston? Why not spread out the refugees to towns all over so each one has less impact on their infrastructure. You are just transplanting the disaster, not mitigating it. If every town within 300 miles took a busload or two they wouldn't have a problem finding shelter for them.

good points gfret. Spreading the people out would be much better.
I too wonder about the boats. Can only imagine the waters are too shallow for boats and too deep for vehicles. But like my wife said, wouldn't those amphibious vehicles at Wisconson Dells be perfect for this?? Don't the reserves have them too?? I still don't get it. I haven't watched too much news on all this, but I feel like I'm not getting the whole story. I can only figure there are reasonable explainations for why the efforts are not showing enough results, but that wouldn't sell commercial time now would it. I don't fully trust the angle being taken by the media, but who knows really.

The Coast Guard must have lots of shallow draft boats in the bayou.
Around here (similar mangrove islands) the sheriff uses a Rigid Inflatable Boat with jet ski engine in it. That puppy will run in 5" of water.
They could make a train of regular rubber life rafts towed behind the RIB with a few rescue swimmers and run it like the parking lot tram at Disney World.

There were a bunch of private boats picking people up for a while but I think the cops stopped them.

I guess nobody read my post about jet ski and tow sleds. Here on Oahu we have plenty of those posted around the Island, manned by our lifeguard crews, for the purpose of high surf rescue jobs. Jet ski's get into very shallow water. Our lifeguards (who I think are the worlds finest, by the way), have pulled people out of 40 foot surf conditions who have suffered broken necks, broken backs, broken limbs, major puncture wounds, and still got em back to dry land alive. IMHO, any lowlying town along any major waterway ought to have at least some similar type setup for when the flood arives. I know its too late for New Orleans now, but how many times have we seen ariel shots on tv of flooded areas along the Mississippi river? Seems like every other year or so.

Funny, I saw a show about the enormous computer-controlled rotating dyke the Dutch built a couple weeks ago.

My reaction then was what it is now: How silly.

This country has a zillion square miles of land that is not in a flood plain. Why not build there?

"This country has a zillion square miles of land that is not in a flood plain. Why not build there?"

... Because somebody else owns that high ground?

I bet the high ground around NOLA is dotted with McMansions. You notice you didn't see many rich people in the flood.

I think they should just pay the owners, scrape the flooded area and carpet the river with barges of dirt until there is a hill there. THAT will be valuable property that folks like Toll Bros, Lennar or Centex would be happy to develop for you.

A couple of interesting facts.....

Almost a year ago, (Oct 2004), National Geographic did an article on the Delta, that almoost exactly described the effects a hurricane would have there. The problems are not new, were not unknown- and now we have no choice but to deal with them.

As for sending in the Coast Guard...I have been told that Coast Guard vessels have relatively little room for people. Ratherm instead the US Navy has dispatched at least three amphibious assault ships; there are ships wit bunks for thousands of troops, enormous well decks, and stuffed with landing craft- vessels ideal for shallow waters. The USS Comfort, a hospital ship, is also on scene.

This is not a little mess confined to New Orleans. Major parts of the Gulf, an area roughly the size of Great Britain, has been devastated.

Both the Navy and by proxy the Marine Corps have what are reffered to as MEP ships. They are merchant marine vessels, that carry everything needed to invade and support troops on the ground. But what they also have on them are hundreds of reverse osmosis units, as well as a large one on ship for making drinking water. (Which include many extra enoumous pumps.) They also have hundreds of generators from 30-500kw and a few high voltage 2Mw's, not to mention ship to shore power. (Enough to light a conservitively lit city.) Shrink-wrapped helicopters. They also have hundreds of Hummvees, and 5ton trucks that ford water from 4-6'+. Amphibious landing craft. Tents, food, water, and reffer units. Hundreds of thousands of gallons of deisel fuel. All in one big boat. A one stop shop for everything to invade a country, or get one out of severe need in a flood. I have un-loaded and loaded dozens of these. They float these things world wide and always have a few in case a situation arises. (I believe two are even based out of NOLA, although they may not be there now.) Think the situation has arisen. Hopefully a few will be seen there soon.

Now back to something electrical.... Having done some "field expediant wiring" myself. Which can be real quick, and on the fly, but works when you need it. They can start getting power to certain key places in the city real quick by isolating them from the grid, most of which is down. Then placing generators every few blocks or so. Or right under the transformer cans. Un-do the LV side, and connect that to the generator. Do the short hunt, and get some power back on while the HV side gets re-worked. When the transformer gets hot again, switch it back over. You just gotta make sure that everyone cooperates, and leaves the AC off. Otherwise a 60kw will run a whole residential city block or two easy. All of the hospitals should have generators already. If not the same can be done with a larger gen set. It's a lot of gen sets, but like I said, the military has them, by the 10's of thousands. And it doesn't have to be the whole city, just a few key places. Some lights at night, and some food in a fridge would add some comfort to a very uncomfortable situation.

How many people were "electrocuted" because of the floods?

My guess would be that very few were. Power went out early from the news reports I saw, before the major flooding occured.