Fearing riots, Guard rejects food airdrops

Stars & Stripes ^ | 9/3/05 | Jeff Schogol

[Syco]

Interesting response to the question of why they don't just drop in supplies from the air.

[CarolinaPeach]

With so much looting already in progress, I can see the point. Also, if anyone were to be crushed to death beneath an airdrop, the headlines would scream the news and yet again, the Bush Administration would be faulted.

[FlingWingFlyer]

I know it's all "Bush's fault" but why aren't they having these problems in Biloxi and Baton Rouge? Those towns were hit just as hard. Why is it only in Nawlins?

[cwb]

This has been said before. What you'd see would look like the images in Somalia, as people beat and shot each other to get to the food and water. There weren't enough LE people to control the large crowds as their lives would've also been endangered.

[Zenith]

Because of the Shootings in N.O.

The Red Cross and the Salvation Army did not go into NO.

They would not be safe.

[em2vn]

Afghanistan wasn't flooded. Where do you air drop anything in a flooded area.

[Syco]

You're wrong! Biloxi was hit even harder.

[new yorker 77]

Lack of Local Leadership.

Ray Gavin and Kathleen Blanco have spent more time crying than preparing, evacuating and guiding their state's citizens.

[cripplecreek]

I'm watching a gaurd chopper drop boxes to people right now.

[stlnative]

FOX is showing live - MRE and Water drops right now

[prion]

I know it's all "Bush's fault" but why aren't they having these problems in Biloxi and Baton Rouge?

Baton Rouge was not particularly damaged, to my knowledge. In fact, they've absorbed a huge number of people from New Orleans. Biloxi, on the other hand, was almost utterly destroyed.

Still, there's no question the lawlessness of New Orleans before the flood is the main reason for the savagery afterwards.

[Mike Darancette]

All of the dry areas of NO (especially early on) were full of angry milling crowds. Dropping supplies would have started riots.

[mattdono]

It really comes down to the flooding.

Biloxi was hit actually harder than N.O. And even though the roads are filled with debris, they aren't under 12 feet of water, like N.O.

I think that's the difference. And the sheer number of people in N.O. vs. Biloxi. It's logistics.

And the fact that N.O. is really a town of lawlessness and corruption. This kind of looting is really a result of the culture that pervades N.O.

[MEG33]

I'm watching them do a drops into flooded waters..live on TV..There are people still trapped in the city..but to drop them around the convention center or any large gathering could get people trampled.
Dropping into houses also.

[FlingWingFlyer]

I know. Before the MSM made Nawlins and racism "the story," I had read that Biloxi was "flattened." I guess that won't be "Bush's fault" until the Nawlins racism story fades out.

[wardaddy]

the thug culture is much larger in NOLA

the Mississippi coast simply has less of that

you can google it if you like

[the invisib1e hand]

,i>I know it's all "Bush's fault" but why aren't they having these problems in Biloxi and Baton Rouge? Those towns were hit just as hard. Why is it only in Nawlins?

A very sneaking suspicion the "anarchy" is organized.

[MEG33]

Gangs

[aimhigh]

Authorities are avoiding airdropping provisions into New Orleans — the traditional way of supplying disaster victims — out of fear of sparking riots, a state official said.

Liberals are always operating out of fear rather than logic.

[jammer]

I don't know about Biloxi and Baton Rouge. I do know from firsthand reports of colleagues and friends that inland in MS about 50 miles, there is a LOT of this going on.