Just thinking, if this gets out of hand, Can Pepper Spray/CS Gas be outfitted to be disbursed from helicopter gunships, so that these quick birds could swoop in low and unload a good tearful batch on these groups of looters? Just keep loading up, returning to the area, and spraying them again and other groups with the payloads? I'm sure word would spread and they'd knock this crap off. It might be a little more humane than using the helicopter gunships for their main, designed purpose? Of course, the helos would probably take ground gunfire from the 'oppressed' justifiably helping themselves. /sarc
Updates as they come in on Katrina
01:29 PM CDT on Tuesday, August 30, 2005
Tom Planchet
1:30 P.M. - --The American Red Cross says it has thousands of volunteers mobilized for the hurricane. Spokesman Bradley Hague said it's the "largest single mobilization that we've done for any single natural disaster." The organization has set up operational headquarters in Baton Rouge.
--The Environmental Protection Agency dispatched emergency crews to Louisiana and Texas because of concern about oil and chemical spills.
--The Coast Guard closed ports and waterways along the Gulf Coast and positioned craft around the area to conduct post-hurricane search and rescue operations.
--The Agriculture Department said its Food and Nutrition Service would provide meals and other commodities, such as infant formula, distilled water for babies and emergency food stamps.
--The Defense Department dispatched emergency coordinators to Alabama, Florida, Louisiana and Mississippi to provide communications equipment, search and rescue operations, medical teams and other emergency assistance.
--The Health and Human Services Department sent 38 doctors and nurses to Jackson, Mississippi, to be used where needed, and 30 pallets of medical supplies to the region, including first aid materials, sterile gloves and oxygen tanks.
Some six-thousand National Guard personnel from Louisiana and Mississippi who would otherwise be available to help deal with the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina are in Iraq.
Even so, Pentagon spokesman Lawrence Di Rita said the states have adequate National Guard units to handle the hurricane needs. He said about six-thousand-500 National Guard troops were available in Louisiana, about seven-thousand in Mississippi, nearly ten-thousand in Alabama and about eight-thousand-200 in Florida.
1:26 P.M. - Officials at LSU and local hospitals say they are triaging thousands of people being brought from outside the Baton Rouge area for medical care. The people are being bused in.
Not only are they stealing from shops, but breaking into homes! FGS!