What I said was the Governor, nor in my opinion, the Mayor, seem to have had a plan for this scenario.
Not that personnel weren't implementing a plan, as best they could without communication.
But just let me ask you this:
If you knew the Super Dome was going to be used as a "refuge of last resort" and that was part of your plan, don't you think you would have planned for additional toilet facilities, knowing that if the city flooded the sewage wouldn't work.
How hard would it have been to bring in some "porta potties" ahead of time. If you had a plan and saw a hurricane coming, you could have had that done in a matter of hours...but you would have had to plan ahead.
And that is just a minor detail. What about nursing homes that were unmanned? I live in a community that when an evac order is given the nursing homes are the first evacuated to high ground.
Probably the real problem is that they just waited till too late to give evac orders, but beyond that, I really think they didn't believe this could ever happen.
It just seems odd that with this scenario looming all these years that no one has ever laid out a detailed plan of what would happen and when, should a large hurricane be bearing down on NO.
99.9999% of the response to disasters is planned out ahead of time, yers ahead of time. The plans that are being executed now have been around for a long time.
Evety plan developed assumes that there will be no comms for days or weeks. Everyoe knows what to do. Eveyone who must be there is there, those who can bug out do so.
It is quite difficult to plan for a disaster of this size, but obviously they have done quite well. People are being rescued, refuge shelters are being set up and food will shortly be available.
As far as the refugee's comfort, no one cares, they care only about getting more people out. The comfort will come later and I'm certain it will be welcome, but now is not the time to gripe about creature comforts. The only part of the plan being worked is to get people to safety.
And that is entirely proper.
There may be some screw ups along the way, but we are dealing with rescue personnel who, at this point, are already tired. They have been working since last night to bring people to higher ground.
I've worked with these people and they are the best you will ever encounter, dedicated to saving lives and secondarily, protecting property.
Unless you have been in a flood, you really don't realize how overwhelming it can be and at the same time how courageously people stand and deliver in the face of extraordinarly bad odds.
For those people on the ground this is total war.