Stream of officials coming to Baton Rouge for supplies

Stream of officials coming to Baton Rouge for supplies and help
BATON ROUGE, La. -- Amos Cormier left his nearly submerged home parish with a list of needs: weapons, explosives, a satellite phone _ and 200 bodybags.

Cormier, chairman of the Plaquemines Parish Council, wanted assistance from Gov. Kathleen Blanco and state officials, but he had to hand-deliver his list Friday to the emergency operations center coordinating disaster response to Hurricane Katrina because communications in the lower-lying parish are entirely cut off.

Days after Katrina left much of southeastern Louisiana underwater, lacking power and without phone service, New Orleans has been the focal point on television and in newspapers, and officials in other parishes have been struggling to get attention, supplies and help to ferry people to higher ground. They've been traveling to the state operations center regularly, seeking assistance and walking directly to TV cameras and reporters broadcasting their needs.

"We have been very isolated," Cormier said of his parish, a thin swath of marshland and tiny towns that stretch out into the Gulf of Mexico where the eye of Katrina blew ashore. "Communications have been a tremendous problem."

U.S. Rep. Charlie Melancon, D-Napoleonville, estimated 100 people died at a wharf in St. Bernard Parish awaiting rescue while hundreds other still languished there and communications systems remained mainly inoperable.

"We've been losing people. There's no two ways about it. People have been getting sick. We don't have medical supplies," said state Sen. Walter Boasso, who represents the parish.

But Boasso said rescue operations were picking up and that the situation had stabilized in St. Bernard Parish with drops of food and water helping sustain people waiting for the boats that would take them to buses and shelters.

Boasso said 10,000 people had been picked from roofs, buildings and other patches of dry ground and evacuated on buses from the parish, and the evacuations by airlift, boats and ferries were continuing Friday.

In parishes north of New Orleans, people might not have been stranded, but local officials often still were unable to communicate their needs to the outside world. Washington Parish President M.E. "Toye" Taylor called into a local Baton Rouge radio station Thursday night to get information out to evacuees who were hungry for news of their hometowns.

"Help is not coming to us. We're on our own," he said, adding the entire parish was without power and communications systems were completely down.

The yellow-encased satellite phone was a key provision that Cormier acquired in his visit to Baton Rouge _ and he got promises of help with the other requests he carried from the parish president and sheriff.

"They just were not aware of the situation," he said.

Among the items needed: the bodybags, 50 military police officers to help battle looters is isolated pockets of the parish, 50 assault weapons, 50 shotguns, a disaster medical assistance team, explosives and explosive experts to dynamite the back levee and help the water escape the parish.

Over half the parish was underwater, and Cormier estimated 20,000 people of the 27,000-population parish would be displaced.

"As of yesterday, we still had people on the levee" waiting to be rescued, Cormier said.

Copyright 2005 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.ged home parish with a list of needs: weapons, explosives, a satellite phone _ and 200 bodybags.

Cormier, chairman of the Plaquemines Parish Council, wanted assistance from Gov. Kathleen Blanco and state officials, but he had to hand-deliver his list Friday to the emergency operations center coordinating disaster response to Hurricane Katrina because communications in the lower-lying parish are entirely cut off.

Days after Katrina left much of southeastern Louisiana underwater, lacking power and without phone service, New Orleans has been the focal point on television and in newspapers, and officials in other parishes have been struggling to get attention, supplies and help to ferry people to higher ground. They've been traveling to the state operations center regularly, seeking assistance and walking directly to TV cameras and reporters broadcasting their needs.

"We have been very isolated," Cormier said of his parish, a thin swath of marshland and tiny towns that stretch out into the Gulf of Mexico where the eye of Katrina blew ashore. "Communications have been a tremendous problem."

U.S. Rep. Charlie Melancon, D-Napoleonville, estimated 100 people died at a wharf in St. Bernard Parish awaiting rescue while hundreds other still languished there and communications systems remained mainly inoperable.

"We've been losing people. There's no two ways about it. People have been getting sick. We don't have medical supplies," said state Sen. Walter Boasso, who represents the parish.

But Boasso said rescue operations were picking up and that the situation had stabilized in St. Bernard Parish with drops of food and water helping sustain people waiting for the boats that would take them to buses and shelters.

Boasso said 10,000 people had been picked from roofs, buildings and other patches of dry ground and evacuated on buses from the parish, and the evacuations by airlift, boats and ferries were continuing Friday.

In parishes north of New Orleans, people might not have been stranded, but local officials often still were unable to communicate their needs to the outside world. Washington Parish President M.E. "Toye" Taylor called into a local Baton Rouge radio station Thursday night to get information out to evacuees who were hungry for news of their hometowns.

"Help is not coming to us. We're on our own," he said, adding the entire parish was without power and communications systems were completely down.

The yellow-encased satellite phone was a key provision that Cormier acquired in his visit to Baton Rouge _ and he got promises of help with the other requests he carried from the parish president and sheriff.

"They just were not aware of the situation," he said.

Among the items needed: the bodybags, 50 military police officers to help battle looters is isolated pockets of the parish, 50 assault weapons, 50 shotguns, a disaster medical assistance team, explosives and explosive experts to dynamite the back levee and help the water escape the parish.

Over half the parish was underwater, and Cormier estimated 20,000 people of the 27,000-population parish would be displaced.

"As of yesterday, we still had people on the levee" waiting to be rescued, Cormier said.

Copyright 2005 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

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HURRICANE KATRINA
EMERGENCY CONTACT INFORMATION - info@hurricane.lsu.edu
LSU Hurricane Experts - Media Contact Information
http://hurricane.lsu.edu/

... SOURCES: Ivor van Heerden, Ph.D., director,
Louisiana State University Hurricane Center, Baton Rouge; wire service ...
GOOGLE: DR. IVOR VAN HEERDEN

FEMA officials wouldn't listen; The scenario was dubbed Hurricane Pam:
America's ordeal
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/focus/story/0,6903,1562298,00.html

One of those quoted was Dr Ivor van Heerden, deputy director of the Louisiana State University's Hurricane Centre. In a worst-case situation, he said, with incomplete evacuation: 'We could have up to 45,000 killed and 400,000 trapped on roofs, with 700,000 evacuees who would now be homeless.'

He was more right than wrong. It was not only van Heerden and the New York Times that were sounding the warning. Over the years, because of its urban development and unique geography, it had become clear New Orleans was an accident waiting to happen, a city that had eaten up its natural marsh defences over the years, and that was sinking under its own the weight.

Indeed, prior to 9/11, the Federal Emergency Management Agency - one of the bodies that has drawn the most criticism for the inadequacy of its response in the last week - had listed a major storm surge on New Orleans and the Gulf Coast as one of the three most likely catastrophic events it might have to cope with, along with a major earthquake on the West Coast and a terrorist attack on New York.

At local level, too, the threat to the New Orleans had long been understood. In July last year, federal and state officials ran a simulation exercise to work out what would happen if a category 3 hurricane hit New Orleans.

The prognosis was not good: it would result in billions of dollars' worth of damage. Something had to be done. In 2000, a trial was conducted using a fictional 'Hurricane Zebra'. Again, the warnings were dire. But neither simulation factored in what would happen if the levees failed in addition to water pouring over their tops.

MORE:
http://www.apfn.org/APFN/KATRINA.HTM