Posted on 09/09/2005 11:06:37 AM PDT by hipaatwo
Think local officials are less to blame for deaths in New Orleans than federal officials? In the most jaw-dropping story of the week, UPI has the police chief of Gretna, Louisiana, admitting that he closed off one of the major arteries out of New Orleans on Monday, before the storm hit:
"We shut down the bridge," Arthur Lawson, chief of the City of Gretna Police Department, confirmed to United Press International, adding that his jurisdiction had been "a closed and secure location" since before the storm hit.
"All our people had evacuated and we locked the city down," he said. The bridge in question -- the Crescent City Connection -- is the major artery heading west out of New Orleans across the Mississippi River.
He added that the small town, which he called "a bedroom community" for the city of New Orleans, would have been overwhelmed by the influx. "There was no food, water or shelter" in Gretna City, Lawson said. "We did not have the wherewithal to deal with these people. If we had opened the bridge, our city would have looked like New Orleans does now: looted, burned and pillaged."
The logic of the poor of New Orleans taking over and destroying neighboring suburbs is lost on him.
However, I am impressed with your experiences. I appreciate your understanding of what life is capable of throwing at someone. Who you are and what you have is, at times, of little consequence..
So to this hurricane vet, at first glance this sounds normal.
Shooting at people who walk onto a bridge is normal? Trapping them in a flooded are AFTER a hurricane is normal? Sounds like murder to me.
Actually it connects the east and west banks of Orleans Parish. The first exit (maybe 2) are Orleans and then Jeff Parish starts.
Geraldo was just on Sean Hannity show (radio) and said the bridge was blocked, the people could not get out, he said the bridge went to Mississippi I believe, someone must have listened to him on Hannity Radio show just awhile ago and he was talking about the bridge and the people not being allowed to leave.
Critical difference:
While NY took a substantial hit, it had a disaster recovery plan and workers for the various telephone companies, Con Edison, Brooklyn Union gas, etc, had been integrated and trained to operate within the emergency plan, in co-operatin with the NYPD, FDNY and various Federal agencies. Whatever wasn't worked out beforehand was improvised on the spot.
There were emergency drills prior to 9/11 and they have continued to this day, incorporating all the lessons learned.
New Orlean's (and the state of Louisiana's)plan for anything seems to have been to pray really hard for the storm (or other disaster) to hit anyplace else, and if it didn't, vacillate until it was too late to do anything.
And let's not forget the actions of New Yorkers on that day. There wasn't widespread looting, rioting, or reported rape gangs, and no one was shooting at the rescue workers trying to get thousands out of burning buildings.
You wanna know what's wrong with the entire response to Katrina in LA? Start looking at the citizens of New Orleans and the political leadership of the state, or rather lack thereof.
Thanks. I guess once you've learned these lessons, you start to get a feeling they should be second nature to everyone, you know?
No, I was watching my California Highway Patrol officer jamming that old lady that refused to leave her house in N.O.
And I drew down on some homies after the Northridge Earthquake, so why don't you go paddle out and catch some waves or something.
Thank you , I think I will. I'm looking at a nice pattern outside my house right now.
But just to remind you, YOU were the one who can't read a map, and insinuated as such when you called me "Smarty".
Which, by the way, I am, thank you.
Try not to eat too many krispy kremes.
Excerpt: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/05244/563638.stm
The bridge doesn't seem to be blocked?
Someone had told her that if she could make it to the Huey P. Long Bridge, she could catch a passing bus.
But the bridge has no connection to bus service past or present. If King had made it, she would have been like hundreds of New Orleans residents marooned on the highways, safely above the tide but no closer to a shower, a meal or a good night's sleep.
Beneath the eastern end of the Crescent City Connection, over the Mississippi, groups of residents converged from New Orleans, Gretna and neighboring Orleans Parish. Children dripped sweat in the heat, alongside wilted grownups. Danna Harris was down to a half-gallon of water for herself and her three sons, after walking across the long bridge for the city.
"It's the forgotten land," Harris said. "The last two days ... we've had to count string beans. I never thought I would be counting string beans. Children don't understand. My 11-year-old says as soon as we can get somewhere, he wants ice cream."
Story turns out to be urban legend, read my last post (posted again). Hundreds of people made it across the bridge into Gertna and were without food and water.
Excerpt: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/05244/563638.stm
The bridge doesn't seem to be blocked?
Someone had told her that if she could make it to the Huey P. Long Bridge, she could catch a passing bus.
But the bridge has no connection to bus service past or present. If King had made it, she would have been like hundreds of New Orleans residents marooned on the highways, safely above the tide but no closer to a shower, a meal or a good night's sleep.
Beneath the eastern end of the Crescent City Connection, over the Mississippi, groups of residents converged from New Orleans, Gretna and neighboring Orleans Parish. Children dripped sweat in the heat, alongside wilted grownups. Danna Harris was down to a half-gallon of water for herself and her three sons, after walking across the long bridge for the city.
"It's the forgotten land," Harris said. "The last two days ... we've had to count string beans. I never thought I would be counting string beans. Children don't understand. My 11-year-old says as soon as we can get somewhere, he wants ice cream."
There are horrible people who post on this forum. Awful, sinful, despicable people.
But most of us are not like that. And you are both LOVED on this forum by all the people who count!
PLEASE!!!
ping (see post above):
Per Person - "close" packing shoulder to shoulder, front to back under normal crowd conditions:
Width - "depth" - sq ft - avg wt - lbs / sqft
2.5 ft - 1.5 ft - 3.75 sqft - 175 lbs - 46.67 lbs/sqft
"Average" automobile - Ford Taurus Station Wagon
Width - "length" - sq ft - avg wt - lbs / sqft
6 ft - 14 ft - 84 sqft - 4894 GVW - 58.3 lbs/sqft
This is with the car "full" of course.
And furthermore, the actual deck-load at each tire is much higher, of course...
Not really. There are no "no-go" zones in the United States under most circumstances. Unless there is a clear and present danger, freedom of travel is a guaranteed right. Mere suspicion is not enough.
I still have the same question today, that I had then.
Has anyone looked at the Gretna "disaster plans"?
All cities and towns usually have "joint" plans. Was there a plan and was it being followed by Gretna officials.
Did the Gretna police have discretionary powers.
Alright, that's more than one question..
Did the fact that NOLA failed to adhere or follow its own disaster plan, did this effect a plan in nearby towns?
But digging up this information is a little worrisome to me, for security reasons.
Somewhere, somehow, I'm sensing being played for a fool. Maybe it's my fatigue talking. But there's something really not settling right with me in re the Gretna story(ies).
Maybe because the story isn't true (see excerpted story below)?
Beneath the eastern end of the Crescent City Connection, over the Mississippi, groups of residents converged from New Orleans, Gretna and neighboring Orleans Parish. Children dripped sweat in the heat, alongside wilted grownups. Danna Harris was down to a half-gallon of water for herself and her three sons, after walking across the long bridge from the city.
>It doesn't really matter. It's a public roadway. All members of the public may use it, especially in an emergency. Here in the USA, we have freedom to travel as we wish on the public roadway.
This idiot blocked an exit route. Too bad the National Guard wasn't available to explain to the nice man that he was going to have to move his officers off the bridge and let the folks from NO pass.<
Bravo, well said!
Could you name a few? I want to know who to avoid. Thanks.
"THE COST OF CRONYISM [Rod Dreher] It would be very wrong, I believe, to let the ignominious Michael Brown be the scapegoat for FEMA's sins. Check out this front-pager from the WaPo. Turns out that a raft of FEMA's top leaders have little or no emergency management experience, but are instead politically well connected to the GOP and the White House. This is a scandal, a real scandal. How is it possible that four years after 9/11, the president treats a federal agency vital to homeland security as a patronage prize? The main reason I've been a Bush supporter all along is I trusted him (note past tense) on national security -- which, in the age of mass terrorism, means homeland security too. Call me naive, but it's a real blow to learn that political hacks have been running FEMA, of all agencies of the federal government! What if al-Qaeda had blown the New Orleans levees? How much worse would the crony-led FEMA's response have been? Would conservatives stand for any of this for one second if a Democrat were president? If this is what Republican government means, God help the poor GOP Congressmen up for re-election in 2006."
But others post differently. There are those with the right values and those with the wrong ones, in any neighborhood. It comes with the territory. Having said that, this story as my posts reflect, just enrages me. I normally have a calmer tone.
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