Ready or Not...
Hurricane season officially commences June 1, and Accuweather is predicting another above-average year in the Atlantic (although nothing like last year's record-shattering season). This year, the forecaster is betting on 3 major hurricanes to make landfall in the United States and expect June and July to be busiest in the Gulf of Mexico, with the Texas coast likeliest to bear the brunt early on. That would be bad news for already soaring fuel prices as the Gulf energy supply is likely, once again, to be disrupted. Meanwhile, the Christian Science Monitor reports that some 110,000 hurricane evacuees are still living in temporary shelters, including FEMA's infamous "toxic trailers." And, as National Hurricane Center director Max Mayfield notes, a trailer is not exactly the place you want to be in a storm.
The Monitor quotes Ivor van Heerden, deputy director of Louisiana State University's Hurricane Center as saying: "The big lesson we learned from Katrina is that, as a nation, we are totally unprepared for large, complex disasters. My concern is that we are still totally unprepared."
4 Comments:
The levees aren't ready. The evacuation plan isn't ready. The Army Corps of Engineers is about to release 9 volumes explaining why they aren't responsible. No wonder my family and firends in New Orleans can't sleep at night.
New Orleans residents aren't the only ones have troubles sleeping. We, here in Baton Rouge have troubles too. Mandatory evacuation will be called for every Cat. 2 storm that approaches New Orleans and the evacuees will once again be coming to Baton Rouge. Do we have the stamina and fortitude to help those in need once again? Only time will tell.
I wonder whether it's even possible to evacuate the bigger cities along our seaboards. Remember the disastrous attempt last year to vacate Houston?
It is too bad our countries' mentality of building in flood zones and flood planes has not change.
It really needs to!
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