Katrina 2005

[Trumpetmaster]

I also heard them say there was no time to detach the casino's and move them to a safer location.

[Trumpetmaster]

BTW - Shapley - Thanks so much for the link with pictures!!!

[Shapley]

TM,

No problem. It's worth going back and visiting from time to time, they add new pictures reqularly.

V/R
Shapley

[Trumpetmaster]

Great! I will check it out as time goes by...

There was an article on MSN that the Mayor of NOLA fears thousands dead.....

I'm glad my parents are moving to Augusta as
they are so close to the Gulf of Mexico.

There was a picture from above where the Aquarium was completely destroyed.... This is so tragic...

I'm sure the engineers can build temporary infrastructure quick to get help to all those in need ASAP...

Each time I look at those pictures.... I'm speechless at the devestation....

<small>[ 08-31-2005, 05:08 PM: Message edited by: TrumpetMaster ]</small>

[piqaboo]

Its really hard to get help to folks after a hurricane, even after the floodwaters subside.
The roads are blocked with debris. Powerlines that are down might be live, etc.

Folks get trapped in their neighborhoods. They cant get out and its hard to get in. After Andrew, folks would load up their cars with food and water and go cruising the hit neighborhoods, up one road and down another, til they found folks that needed the supplies. Cant really do that with the flooding.

I still wonder where all that debris is going to go, once they get around to the cleaning up stage.

They arent letting in volunteers yet. I hope that by tomorrow, they see their way clear to letting in folks with flatbottom and lowdraft boats, to tool around taking supplies, supplement the rescue workers etc. For now, it is venice and boats are the way to go.

[analog]

Originally posted by piqaboo:
I hope that by tomorrow, they see their way clear to letting in folks with flatbottom and lowdraft boats, to tool around taking supplies, supplement the rescue workers etc. For now, it is venice and boats are the way to go.

HOORAY MRS BOO!!!!!! Do you think you could get that suggestion to Laura Bush?? She's got more sense than the rest of them combined.

Small boats could effect a Dunkirk style rescue, freeing Helicopters to transport food and medics to dry spots. Maybe they could land C130's on a dry strech of downtown expressway.

FEMA is falling flat on their face. What New Orleans needs right now is about five hundred rednecks with their jonboats. I could be there in about seven hours.

<small>[ 08-31-2005, 05:53 PM: Message edited by: analog ]</small>

[BigJon@Work]

I've ranted before on here about lack of hurricane resistant design of housing hurricane prone areas. It is not impossible to design a house or business that will withstand cat 5 hurricanes. It doesn't have to be expensive, but you will have some esthetic issues in that the houses won’t look like the houses we are used to. I bet those that rebuild will be permitted use designs that can’t withstand a cat 5 and we will continue to be asked to insure their losses through federal disaster assistance.

[analog]

Originally posted by BigJon@Work:
I've ranted before on here about lack of hurricane resistant design of housing hurricane prone areas. ...... we will continue to be asked to insure their losses through federal disaster assistance.

The National Flood Insurance program was created to ".. promote economic development in areas where it would not be otherwise feasible because of risk...".. What a guaranteed porkchop to the insurance industry. Time to reconsider it.

Also time to question the wisdom of (re)building a major city below sea level in hurricane territory.

[piqaboo]

The Spanish, French, americans and Creoles who created the famous french quarter and garden district were not privy to those hurricane resistant designs. Being as those are historic districts, I doubt they'll be allowed to make major visible changes.

I wonder how the shotgun style houses fared.

[monkeymd2b]

So here's a little news about I-10. It is elevated in parts but does come a bit lower here and there. I-10 west to baton rouge is flooded (remember that post earlier with the idiot driving straight into the big pool of water? That was I-10 west between new orleans and Metairie (where I lived). And it floods during regular heavy rain storms the area gets so no surprise it floods with hurricanes and tropical storms of any strength/category. Just sort of a fact of life for that road. Of course, the flooding resolves after regular rainstorms since the pumps don't reliably fail until a storm is considered a tropical storm or higher.

And for a city that regularly floods, the police are idiots when it comes to directing traffic around impassable roads. You would think they would know vulnerable areas and have plans...I don't think they know how to plan. Evacuations, whether voluntary or "mandatory" are always last minute (You can call Bob Breck of Fox news in NOLA for his rant...he was pulled off air a couple years back when we had isidore then Lily come for a visit). The only people who follow mandatory evacuations had already left a day earlier than the statement is made. People just aren't too convinced that a storm would dare hit the city. I mean, last year, Ivan turned at the last minute and since there have been other close calls, people think, oh, this one will be just the same, no need to leave since last time nothing happened. Then there are the psychos, like my friend Jeff, who get excited when a storm is coming because he had never seen a devastating storm prior to this one of course. I'm sure his parents made him and his equally psycho sister leave NOLA and get up to lafayette since they made them leave for ivan last year. I certainly left when I realized it might not turn...but then it turned.

Sigh...the city is a mess with people making sure the murder and crime rates won't slacken despite katrina. I need to get some rest. TOmorrow is the start of a new rotation at a hospital I've never been to before.

[zlosin]

good luck monkeymdib, sound like you are in for a "special" day. All the best.

[dai bread]

Thanks for the info on the building of NO below sea level. I hadn't realised the Gulf Coast was that low for so much of its extent.

They built hurricane-proof houses on Niue Island. They're small, made of concrete blocks, with small windows, and wouldn't be readily acceptable to almost anyone. Nevertheless, they've survived several hurricanes, except where the sea has tossed rocks at them, which it does from time to time.

Those who want to know how to plug a hole in a levee should talk to a civil engineer who builds hydro electricity dams, and ask him how he stops up his upstream coffer dam. The last one I saw being blocked involved a couple of big stockpiles of rock and two steady streams of bulldozers, one after another, pushing the rock into the river from both sides.

What's a shot-gun style house?

[OperaTenor]

So what I heard from the mayor the other night, I heard correctly; the pumps are westbound out of NOLA.

Thanks for the info, Mmdub, and good luck tomorrow.
BTW, how is it being a working Dr. these days?

[piqaboo]

Thats how I saw the coffer dam for the YAngzte river being built. Problem is, they have to airlift in those rocks right now. Probably hoping the concrete road barriers and the 3000 lb sandbags will act as rock substitutes.


Shotgun = long and narrow, with the various rooms pretty much in a line. Fire a shotgun in the front door and you'll hit all the rooms. Very common in older 'not wealthy' sections of NOLA.

[Serenity]

Despite its name, the French Quarter is known for its Spanish architecture, with broad window openings and balconies with lacy ironwork railings. A walking tour is a good way to explore the area.

Jackson Square, in the heart of the Quarter, bustles with street musicians, dancers, jugglers, palm readers and a variety of characters. Artists show their works using the iron fences as a display rack.. The bronze equestrian statue of Andrew Jackson has inscribed at its base "The Union Must and Shall Be Preserved".

Other points of interest include St. Louis Cathedral, one of the oldest and most photographed churches in the country.

Plan to spend 3 or 4 hours at the National D-Day Museum. Traveling down the banks of the Mississippi, you'll find the Audubon Aquarium of the Americas, featuring a 400,000 gallon Gulf of Mexico exhibit, Caribbean reef tunnel, Amazon Rainforest and Mississippi River galleries.

The award-winning Audubon Zoo is home to 1500 animals representing 560 species. The Louisiana Swamp Exhibit re-creates the culture and wildlife of a 1930s Cajun settlement.

The unique tombs in the city's cemeteries intrigue first-time visitors. Tombs were originally built above ground because of the moist soil.

Cajuns, who mostly live in the Bayou country of southern Louisiana, are descendents of the Acadians who fled Canada in the mid-1700s. Creoles are descendents of the French and Spanish who settled in the city. Cajun fare tends to be spicier than Creole.

Beignets are the Louisiana state doughnut. They are square, fluffy pastries covered with powdered sugar.

[zlosin]

Its beginning to look, to me anyway, that there were no real plans for this type of disaster. I mean, there are whole neighbor hoods where no one has looked for survivors, (as on NBC news) the camera crew was saving peoples lives.
What the heck is going on down there, beginning day 3 and just now they are moving ppl from the superdome.
This is going to get a whole lot worse before it gets any better.

[Nicole Marie]

I agree, it will get worse before it gets better. I can't believe folks are shooting at the military helicopters, the very helicopter saving people. I can understand the looting to the degree that folks need food, water and dry clothing but when I see on the news someone stealing a large screen TV... or to the folks starting fires IN the Superdome... well... I can't say what I'd really like to say.

I also saw on CNN this morning an interview with a Congressman from New Orleans. He was talking about how his district has been pleading for years for fed dollars to help upgrade the levees and restore areas of the coast line. He was saying the worst has happened because no major upgrades to the coastline systems have happened since the 60's. He also stated that the levees held until after the storm but the ground was so wet that they basicaly slipped and then the flooding started.

I also caught part of a report that a National Guard member has been shot during the looting. I only caught part of the report and can't find any more info. Does anyone know?

[Serenity]

These people don't know how to loot. Why didn't they go loot something useful like a canoe, camping equipment, non-perishable food items? Why a roll of lottery tickets? Did they really think they could claim the big prize? "OH, so-and-son won the lottery with a ticket in New Orleans! Congratulations here are your millions!"

[Shapley]

The situation has clearly gotten out of hand down there. In many areas they are having to halt the rescue operations because of the presence of armed thugs in the landing areas.

The Governor of Louisiana was bemoaning the fact that disasters usually bring out the best in people, but apparenlty not in New Orleans. I think the problem there is that they let the situation go too long. People follow by example, and there was no good example to follow in the aftermath of the storm.

Regarding the design of buildings: it appears that most of the historic structures in the French Quarter have survived, again. Most of these are heavily built of brick or stone.

Serenity,

regarding your travelogue: It sounds wonderful, but I wonder how much of that survived the hurricane, or will survive its aftermath. I was curious about the D-Day Museum, since I had planned to visit it when I was to be in New Orleans this winter.

MonkeyMD: Thanks for the info on I-10. It has been a while since I was there, and I flew in, so I didn't have to go too far West. I drove there many years ago, but came in on US Highway 61, which is on a causeway through the swamps West of the city for what seemed like an endless number of miles.

V/R
Shapley

[Schmeelkie]

Thanks everyone for the updates - I don't get to watch the news a lot (not good for little ones), so you guys and the newspaper (which I'm a couple of days behind on) are my only sources of info.

On previous trips to NO, I've explored the French Quarter, Jackson Square, been to the Aquarium and the big mall along the river, seen the tombs and eaten many beignets. Any word on how these places are holding up? The Aquarium is right on the river...how would you evacuate an aquarium? Did they get the animals out of the zoo?

Guess Canal St. is really a canal now.

Can't imagine how long it will take to rebuild...