Good Thing He Had Nothing Better To Attend To...

[Annie]

http://www.newsday.com/news/local/wire/ny-bc-ny--katrina-symposium0912sep12,0,4778674.story

Disaster official at NY symposium: Planners didn't anticipate gun problem after Katrina


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By DAVID B. CARUSO
Associated Press Writer

September 12, 2005, 4:45 PM EDT

NEW YORK -- Emergency officials who prepared Louisiana's plan for responding to a major hurricane never guessed that one of their duties would be to protect aid workers from gunmen, one of the state's senior disaster officials said Monday.

Speaking at a symposium in New York, Arthur Jones, chief of disaster recovery for Louisiana's Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness, said he was caught off guard by the violence in New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina.

No disaster planner, he said, predicted that people would loot gun stores after the storm and shoot at police, rescue officials and helicopters.

Jones said the flow of aid to the city was delayed because officials were not able to guarantee the safety of American Red Cross workers and other volunteers.

"That's never been in any plan," Jones said in an interview following his speech to the emergency response officials at the symposium. "Unfortunately, in the future, it will have a place at the table."

Jones took time off from his disaster recovery duties Monday to participate in the symposium on emergency preparedness sponsored by New York Downtown Hospital. The event was planned months before Katrina hit.

Jones initially was scheduled to lecture on lessons learned by studying a simulated storm, dubbed Hurricane Pam. The analysis of the fictitious storm was still under way when Katrina struck the Gulf Coast.

The projections from the simulated hurricane proved strikingly accurate, Jones said. Planners had anticipated that the storm would cause a catastrophic flood that would leave much of southeast Louisiana uninhabitable for months.

Jones said planners learned better lessons from Katrina, including the need to have more satellite phones for rescuers and better funding for flood protections throughout the Mississippi delta.

He also said the humanitarian disaster in New Orleans could have been lessened if more people had heeded orders to leave the city as Hurricane Katrina approached.

Jones complained that a mandatory evacuation order issued by New Orleans' mayor the day before the storm went "essentially unheeded" by tens of thousands of people.

Many of those people later sought refuge in the Superdome, which Jones said hadn't been stocked with food or water because it was only supposed to have been used as a shelter of last resort.

"Should the people have gotten out? Should have," Jones said. "What does `mandatory' mean to everyone in here? If someone tells you it is mandatory to get out of this room right now, what are you going to do? I'm headed for the exit."

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On the Net:

Louisiana emergency preparedness office: http://www.ohsep.louisiana.gov/

 

[Adam's Apple]

Hope they will work into the next emergency plan not only the gun looters but also the sexual "looters". One thing we all learned from Katrina's aftermath was that women and children have a right to be protected from such goons in a disaster of this magnitude.