In the aftermath of the accusations and counter-accusations regarding FEMA and Katrina, I tried to look up what happened in former disasters. I was really looking to see if FEMA really does require a formal request from the governor of the affected area, and if it has to be in the proper form. There’s nothing that helps on this – Jeb Bush evidently declared an emergency in the case of hurricane Charley in 2004, but so apparently did Louisiana in 2005.
What struck me was the congratualotory tone over how well FEMA (This same FEMA, with Brown in charge) responded to Charley in 2004, and how much better it was than the slow response to Andrew, when it took three days to get supplies in. Here’s only one article on this: http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2004/08/26/fema_learned_from_hurricane_andrew_in_1992?mode=PF
It notes how supplies were poised to go in , and stressed the importancve of getting in right away, as soon as possible.
So what happened between Charley and Katrina? In an ideal world Charley would have been the test case that proved FEMA was ready to handle a problem like Katrina (which showed signs of being more serious), having improved their capabuilities since Andrew. But that’s not how it worked out.
I realize that situations are invariably different – Florida has to be more accessible that Louisiana – but the common complaint is that supplies and manpower were available but underutilized – which is exactly what Charley was supposed to demonstrate wouldn’t happen. I realize, as well, that everyone is saying that the state and city were supposed to request aid, and that the federal government couldn’t supply it until they did. But, even if true (and the governor and mayor are vehemently denying this), it conjures up an image of Brown , the President, and the commander of the Bataan sitting anxiously by their telephones, saying, “Gee, I wish they’d call, so I can help. It’s frustrating to sit here useless.” This is patently absurd – surely, in a crisis like this, communcation is two-way. Surely someone at FEMA was trying to get through to available authority in Louisiana to get the rubber-stamp authority necessary to send in desperately needed aid.
So what’s the real story? And why isn’t anyone else bringing Charley up?
Agggh! Double post! Could a mod remove one of these?
And if you’re wondering why I posted here rather than in GQ, I figured that a lot of the responses would generate a lot of heat.
And I’m not trying to be partisan in this – my question really is “How could FEMA have been so responsive and supportive and fast a year ago and not be so in what was known to be a higher level hurricane now?” And nobody brings up last year at all. To listen to many critics, FEMA has been in decline since the start of the Bush administration, and this would seem to contradict that. No supporters bring it up, possibly because they don’t want to start comparisons with last year’s response. But then why don’t the detractors bring it up?
A cynic might point out another difference, that Florida is not only the keyest of the key swing states on Election Night, but has the President’s brother for a governor. One might also point out that FEMA was headed by as politically hacky an appointee as political hacks come. The rest is CYA, nothing more.
Quite true – I’ve visited several sites on this,. Nevertheless, there were multiple reports (including film footage) of the unused hospital facilities and the unused water supplies (the Batraan had desalinization capabilituies), and there’s this:
Now responses to this site complains about the veracity of the newsreports: http://www.qando.net/details.aspx?Entry=2515
but I still have to ask, unless Captain Tyson was misquoted or quoted out of context, why she or her superiors weren’t asking someone if they could help
Quite simply, it is a matter of allocating resources where they’ll do the most good.
THose operating rooms and beds onboard ship obviously shouldn’t be the first choice for medical care. The logistics of bringing victims to the ship are tremendous, and if shore facilities can handle the job, they are a better choice.
Hospital capacity seems fine once you get away from the area of destruction, so this doesn’t seem to be an issue. And if you need to evacuate people anyway, better to get them to dry land and only do it once.
What the Bataan did do is provide a staging point for Navy medical teams that went into New Orleans to help people on the ground. This seems a much better use of resources than shuttling people back to the ship to be cared for.
First of all, the main issue here isn’t the Bataan, but the logical disconnect for the entire effort. The way both sides are presenting it seemsd absurd – “They didn’t ask for help”“Yes we did”. At times of crisis, communications is two-way and can be immediate. It certyainly was with Florida in the wake of Charley. Why not here?
As far as what the Bataan could have done – it was clear from news reports that there were needs for hospital facilities ASAP in many cases (older [patients died atop hospitals waited for promised airlifts) and for water, which makes the news of the underutilized ship all the more heartrending:
The OP is assuming an agency headed by a poltical hack (Brown) would be equally responsive to a state headed by his boss’ brother and a key swing state, and a state that tends to vote Dem. Facts not in evidence.
Some sites do seem to attribute the difference to this, and to the 2004 elections, and suggest that response wasn’t really as good as the media made it out to be. I don’t know, myself. But I can’t believe that someone would let a humanitarian crisis of this magnitude this close to home grow on partisan grounds.
My basic question is still — WTF? Couldn’t someone just pick up the phone?
I linked to a San Jose Merc article in another thread (I’ll see if I can find it later) which clearly stated that FEMA prepositioned supplies near NOLA days before the hurricane hit, and that they airlifted a ton of food and water to the SuperDome beforehand as well. The article didn’t say how adequate the supplies were and why there was so many problems distributing the supplies after the hurricane, but it is clearly incorrect to say that FEMA didn’t do anything at all to prepare (you didn’t say that explicitly, but it is implied in your OP). Again, I don’t know how this compares to the stitation in Charlie, but the flooding in NOLA clearly was part of the problem.
I don’t know, but some things I’d give a closer look when trying to compare/contrast the two storms:
The breadth of the affected area – Katrina 90,000 sq. miles v. Charley?
The number of people in immediate need of search and rescue and their relative distribution throughout the affected area.
The number of people in immediate need of food, water, medicines and their relative distribution throughout the affected area.
Whether and how many of those in #2 & 3 need to be moved to safety.
Is safety, as referred to in #4, simply higher ground or alternative shelter. Is it currently available? For how long? Is it centralized? Will it meet victim needs, or will it largely be a staging area with triage set-up, etc.?
The relative availablilty of fuel to those in need, assuming those in need can travel to centralized distribution centers for food, water, and medicines.
The destruction to infrastructure, creating mobility problems for victims and first responders. Destroyed roads, bridges, fires, flooding, debris, etc.
Demographics (poor, elderly, infirmed) of the victims in the affected areas and their special needs.
The level of civil disobedience towards first responders, relief workers, and those with police responsibilities.
The communications network. Did it remain intact? Was an alternative quickly provided? Was everyone on the same wavelength (both literally and figureatively!).
The experience of both those administering relief and those in need with storms and their destruction. This would include knowledge of the correct communication protocol required to request relief and its proper execution. How well was it followed between the two storms? Were any protocol errors expeditiously identified and corrected?
The proximity (time and/or place) position of relief resouces.
The actual utilization of these resources.
and so on…
I don’t know, but perhaps the differences in scale of the answers to these questions is one of the reasons why we really haven’t seen much comparison between the 2 storms.
You might not have meant to imply it, but the main thing you emphasized about Charlie was that supplies were prepositioned. The implication was there whether you meant it to be or not. I’m not accusing you of a secret agenda, just pointing out how a casual reader of the OP might interpret it.
A real cynic would point out that FEMA and Mike Brown also paid out $31 million in taxpayer money to thousands of Florida residents who were unaffected by the Florida hurricanes last year, right before the election:
I’ll take this rare opportunity to agree with you and Elvis. But then, I’m already on record as saying that Bush’s response to the 2004 Florida hurricanes, especially his personal involvement, had as much to do about Florida’s swing state status as anything else.
What I wonder is why no one compares Katrina to Ivan, which was a category 5 hurricane that was headed for New Orleans, precipitating the evacuation of some 600,000 people from the New Orleans area.
Of course, Ivan weakened to a 3, then veered east and came ashore in Alabama, and so “only” caused about $14 billion in damage (mostly due to inland flooding after it started moving north through the Atlantic states), so it’s not very comparable.
However, I would think that someone in Louisiana might have wondered whether the response to Ivan’s impending threat was adequate, and, if not, how to be better prepared for the inevitable next hurricane.
