Posted on 09/08/2005 5:39:38 AM PDT by Budgie
Washington, September 8: To cope with the possibility of a huge death toll from Hurricane Katrina, some 25,000 body bags have been readied in New Orleans of Louisiana in United States, a health official said.
Advertisement "It is my understanding that FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency) has about 25,000 body bags on hand," Bob Johanssen of the state Department of Health and Hospitals said on Wednesday.
Asked if authorities expected as many as 25,000 bodies, he said: we don't know what to expect. It means we're prepared."
(Excerpt) Read more at expressindia.com ...
That seems an awful lot.
Is this likely to be right?
Let's hope this is a wild exaggeration.
That seems high. It may also be this number is for the entire storm zone- which is still breathtaking.
Who knows. The one specific account I've heard was of 20 people lashed together around a tree (or lightpole?), presumably in order not to be washed away.
Two reserved for the Mayor and Gov.?
They can always return the bags if not needed.
So far, the local news, the Scotsman and the Guardian have carried this story.
Now the BBC confirms it:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4224912.stm
They readied 10,000 after 9/11, if I recall.
Asked if authorities expected as many as 25,000 bodies, he said: we don't know what to expect. It means we're prepared."
Would they also use them for dead pets? Just asking.
I'm beginning to think that the MSM has blown a lot of things out of proportion with regards to Katrina.
The military ordered about as many before we kicked saddams butt. The left was freaking about that.
I hope the precedent continues.
Bradenton Herald: Low-lying New Orleans fears the worst from storm:
"Walter Maestri, an emergency manager here in America's most vulnerable metropolitan area, has 10,000 body bags ready in case a major hurricane ever hits New Orleans."
25,000?
If this number was even in the ballpark, I would have expected a lot more in the way of survivors or families asking about missing people - even more than after 9/11. I have heard some of these types of stories, but nothing like the volume or coverage after 9/11. Here's hoping.
They said there were going to be 200 dead in the superdome and there were 10, considering the flood happened during the day I would predict they the number for the whole region will still be lower than 9/11. 2,500 would be my estimate.
Bureaucrat: "Bla bla, in storage, bla bla, annual, 25,000, bla, contingency, bla bla,"
Express India: "OMG!!! 25,000 DEADED PERSONS!!1!!!"
That’s very doubtful.
The Red Cross has established a Family Network at http://www.familylinks.icrc.org/katrina/people
A spot check (not comprehensive) seemed to be mostly people searching for other folks; I didn't find many self-registrations. I also started scanning just the name list, and assuming that names that include full addresses are more likely to be self-registrations and names that don't are more likely to be people searching for other people, then that matches my spot observations that mostly that these are "searching for" entries.
There are a lot of names on the list. I stopped looking when I paged through the first 1000 names, and I wasn't even half-way through the letter A listings.
However, there is probably no way for listings to be deleted or marked as no longer needed, so some percentage (hopefully very large) are no longer active.
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