Posted on 08/31/2005 9:08:27 PM PDT by NormsRevenge
NEW ORLEANS – A slow exodus from the smelly and sweltering Superdome began Wednesday as refugees boarded giant trucks and then buses for a trip to more comfortable surroundings in the Houston Astrodome.
The evacuation was kept almost secret to avoid a stampede. People were taken a few at a time through a garage, then to trucks that plowed through 4 feet of water and delivered them to the buses.
People with physical problems were evacuated Wednesday morning, loaded into a variety of vehicles and taken to a triage center in Baton Rouge. The evacuation of the more able-bodied began later.
Almost everyone carried a plastic bag or bundled bedspread holding the few possessions they had left after Hurricane Katrina decimated their city. Some hobbled on walkers, canes and crutches; others inched forward on wheelchairs. Women led children and carried babies.
"I don't care where they're taking us. Anywhere is better than here," said James Caire, 49, who had been at the Superdome only about six hours.
With no air conditioning and little electricity, the heat and stench inside the Superdome were unbearable. As the water pressure dropped lower and lower, toilets backed up. The stink was so bad that many medical workers wore masks as they walked around.
Most refugees jammed onto concourses because the heat and stench inside the Superdome were unbearable. But the heat on the brown-brick concourse was horrendous. One man took a paper bag, rolled up the rim and wore it as a hat.
Dr. Kevin Stephens Sr., in charge of the special needs shelter at the dome, described the Superdome and a nearby arena as a health department's nightmare.
"These conditions are atrocious," he said. "We'll take trucks, planes, boats, anything else, I have to get these people out of here."
By midafternoon, medics were hauling people off one after another because of heat-related problems. Even as the evacuation was going on, people walked through waist-deep water to get to the Superdome.
Tempers flared in the crowd. One woman yelled: "You're just lying to us! You had us standing all day in this heat, and you're lying to us. You're not taking us anywhere!"
The oficer yelled back, "Look, ma'am, do you think I'm in charge? Do you think I'm making decisions? I told you what they told me."
But overall, there was little trouble. People got angry and frustrated and occasionally screamed, but people generally seemed to get along.
The noise around the dome was constant. Helicopters took off and landed on the helipad outside. Generators ran. Trucks backed up and moved past. Every time one baby stopped screaming two more seemed to start. And there was the constant roar of thousands of conversations going on at once.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency has provided about 500 buses to transport the refugees. It was not immediately clear how long the refugees will be in Houston, 350 miles from New Orleans. "We're buying time until we can figure something out," said William Lokey, chief coordinator for the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
The Astrodome's schedule has been cleared through December for housing evacuees, said Kathy Walt, a spokeswoman for Texas Gov. Rick Perry. The building no longer is the home of a professional sports team – the Houston Astros left in 2000.
Phillip Triggs, 40, wasn't keen on the idea of being forced to Texas.
"As far as the idea of going to another state, no, man, this is my home," he said while catching a breath of fresh air. "My family is here. My home is gone. For us to be going through what we're going through, we're just not ready for this."
Cots and blankets for up to 25,000 people were being set up on the Astrodome's floor. Knowing that the people would arrive tired, frustrated and disheartened, shelter organizers began planning activities that might help take the evacuees' minds off their troubles, such as free trips to museums and amusement parks.
Organizers plan to use Astrodome kitchens and locker rooms to keep refugees fed and clean, but they realize it won't be easy because the arena was not built to handle so many people.
"I'm ready to get away from here. Anybody in their right mind would be," said David Ellis, a construction worker who was on the ramp outside the Superdome, escaping the oppressive conditions.
I was wondering, too. If she comes to the Astrodome, I'd like to go meet her :)
I have both, especially perspective. You cannot place 20,000 people in an open dorm room for 6 months and not court complete chaos.
I'm postitive the govt has all of the best of intentions here, but there are still some interesting lessons to be learned from the Superbowl story. Lessons about govt. crowd control.
Note well that these desperate people who lined up to enter the Superbowl were searched, and any weapons were confiscated. Weapons confiscation was the price of entry.
Once in the Superbowl, the thousands were virtually prisoners, who could then be moved anywhere under military police control.
My point is, that under desperate conditions, the govt might just find it necessary or useful to line people up, for example, to get water needed for survival.
But first, before you get your water ration, you get searched, and you lose your firearms, knives etc.
After that, the govt. owns you, for good or for ill. If they say line up now to get onto buses for a convoy to where ever, then you will be going there. You will be under military control, and will not be free to control your destiny.
And most of those who have made comments have actually lived it.
But we wouldn't think you liberals would understand what's it's like with you living up in Washington state and all.
Why not just imprison them? You apparently think there is only one kind of equally useless person seeking refuge from New Orleans.
They are Americans. How frickin spoiled are we that you are already tired of potentially being inconvienced by people whose entire city was destroyed three days ago.
And they won't pick up those living on I-10. It is still screwed up.
Where do you live? We can send them to you, right?
The Astrodome has a lot of parking around it. It's a fair hike and a tall fence before you get to much else of civilization except for the football stadium. If the National Guard is there to treat these folks like it was Gitmo, it might not be that big a problem. But if they keep the doors unlocked and let these people just wander everywhere unchecked, it will be a major problem. And just wait until Jesse and Al and the ACLU show up demanding this and that. Wait until the lawsuits start.
I hope somebody buys a bunch of Eddie Murphy and Cedric the Entertainer DVDs to put on the Jumbotron. That might just keep things down to a roar.
Really? You can back that up? Most of the people posting on Free Republic right now have lost their homes and the city they lived in to some kind of disaster? Wow. I had no idea how lucky I was to live up here with just our measely volcano and a bunch of liberals.
BTTT
Ah, I missed that.
And they won't have any money to sow a "seed faith" offering into his "ministry."
WHAT? You think Al Sharpton will be coming back to Texas after the State Troopers left that boy on the side of the road last weekend? HA!
Certainly not the 87 year old lady I saw being interviewed. She just wanted to go home.
They wanted to make sure that they looked good when they arrived in Houston, that's all.
" These folks, many single and many, as have been shown, have no inhibitions to take what they want are going to sit quietly in that building without taking advantage of the areas many delights i.e Prostitution, drugs and the whole gamut of "entertainment". This is a disaster in the making."
Actually, I think that the people you are talking about are the ones that are still running loose in NO, looting and raising hell.
The people who went to the Superdome seem to be the more responsible and intelligent of the poor people who had no way to get out. Yes, there have been problems in the Superdome and some scum definitely made it's way in there, too, but I think the majority of the people that are coming from the Superdome to the Astrodome are just poor decent people that need some help.
OH BS. I won't be inconvenienced at all. I live 50 miles from the Astrodome. However; this will not end well for anyone and the Astrodome is NOT a damned summer camp cabin for a bunch of kiddies. 20,000 ADULTS cannot live together in an open dormitory. Think about it, that is a fairly large town with the same proportion of good and bad actors you find in any population of the same size. Take that and the area of town they are being placed in and you have a serious problem on your hands.
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