I’m fine, thanks for asking. The eye of the hurricane messed up Tuscaloosa for a couple of days but nothing too serious. My family members on the coast all got to safety and their homes are still standing.
But did your mom end up with your sister, Sampiro? And if so, how could the house be still standing, since I’d think the two of them could stir up their own hurricane-force winds! 
I just heard on NPR that there are at least a couple thousand people at the convention center with no food, water, medical supplies, or security. They say the National Guard stopped by, but didn’t stay. When the Homeland Security head was being asked about this, he kept turning the topic back to the Superdome and said he hadn’t heard any reports about the convention center.
This whole thing just boggles the mind.
I can’t understand why, if the newscasters can get in there, the police and national guard can’t.
I can’t understand why, if the newscasters have plenty of food and water, no one else does. Do their trucks hold enough food, water, and toilet capacity for an entire crew for, what is it now, five days? If not, how are they managing to get supplies, but the residents aren’t?
I can’t understand why, if the newscasters can scoot all over town, the rescuers can’t.
I can’t understand why, if the newscasters can get their stories out so that I can watch it in the next state, the NO police can’t communicate with each other.
News trucks run on gasoline, deisel, generators, all that stuff, don’t they? Where are they getting their supplies?
I finally had to turn it off. The news channels are understandably not showing the dead bodies, but they did show a sea lion trapped in the debris, struggling to get out. To some poeple, me included, a live, suffering, dying animal is as traumatizing as a dead body.
I turned it off then and haven’t been able to turn it back on.
I just don’t understand. I don’t understand why they can’t drop jugs of fresh water from helicopters.
I don’t understand.
The news crews are helping when they can. Shepard Smith’s crew flagged down a cop for a mother and her newborn baby. The baby was five days old, overheated and lethargic. The mother had spent two days in an attic, was picked up by rescue boats and dumped on I-10 with no idea of where to go from there. As Shep was interviewing her, the cop pulled up in a car and piled everyone in, presumably to take them to the hospital.
There was another little boy, three, also overheated and lethargic, and he seemed to revive a bit when the news crews dropped ice down for him.
I’m sorry to tell you that, according to reports I’ve seen, Picayune is almost wiped out. The damage there was supposed to have been catastrophic. I hope those reports are misleading. Best to you and your friend.
Snipers??? Some of them shooting at attempts to evacuate patients who have been trapped in a hospital?
What the fuck? Are people going completely psychotic? 
My sister went down to Baton Rouge yesterday to pick up the dogs. On the way back today, she ran into the freaking gas shortages that have hit the country. I just talked to her a few minutes ago. She’s in a milelong line at a gas station in Canton, MS.
On the brighter side(maybe), her house is still standing with apparently minimal damage. Unfortunately, and I hadn’t wanted to mention them before now because it was so unpleasant, her two cats are still in the house. She’s got a friend who’s a reporter, and she’s given him her two cat carriers so there is some hope.
The apartment my family owns also weathered the storm well. We were remarkably lucky.
It’s amazing to see photos of places I know so well completely covered in water with bands of armed looters roaming the streets.
-Lil
We heard from a family member who made it to Houston, and everyone is accounted for. Even my cousin the doctor. This morning, before my dad called, I was subjected to a rambling rant from a client about “How could these idiots live below sea level? Now they’re going to cost all these tax dollars, blah blah.” Like a clip from that stupid ditch FEMA thread.
Look at my location.
Look at it again. Extrapolate the fact that said client lives in the same location. (Only, actually, she lives on 'reclaimed land" that was once, well, bay. My house, at least, is on bedrock)
It’s the closest I’ve ever come to knocking someone’s teeth in right in my own office.
Vevila, so glad to hear your Dad’s okay.
If anyone sees anything about Charity Hospital in the news please post it.
We haven’t heard from my BIL & SIl since last night.
I’ve heard they are running out of food, no power, have most but not all the patients out and where held up for narcotics?
We’re getting pretty worried.
I’ve been keeping a close eye out on what’s going on at Charity for my old boss, an attorney who works with the Charity healthcare system, since she can’t see the news reports easily during the day.
Last I was able to learn, this afternoon they’d gotten most of the sickest patients out. Several hundred others were able to get out under their own steam. i don’t know if there have been actual break-ins for narcotics, but as of this afternoon there was at least a small (15-20) National Guard presence in the hospital. The shortages are awfully severe, but the staff is just focusing on taking care of the patients. Please keep us posted if you hear anything else, jrfranchi – it’s such a frightening situation.
I also heard via a friend about conditions in Houma tonight:
Where is the damn Red Cross or FEMA? (We know where the Houma National Guardsmen are – in Iraq!) I realize New Orleans is awful, but at least there’s decent transportation and communications and power in Houma – with all the supplies being stockpiled in Baton Rouge, can’t somebody actually SEND them somewhere?
Gah, I hope heads roll over how badly this whole thing is being bungled. Starting with that lying weasel who’s head of FEMA, stating that FEMA is taking supplies into NOLA while people all over the city are reporting that FEMA fled earlier today!
You are absolutely right. It is not just them however. The Department of Homeland Security has this type of disaster response as part of its mission. It is supposed to coordinate efforts between agencies at all levels when events like this occur. They have utterly and completely failed.
Lots of heads need to roll especially because this scenerio was forecasted by a government agency BEFORE Katrina even hit.
I suspect that the Red Cross and FEMA are probably overwhelmed and stretched thin. This is probably going to go down as the worst natural disater in US history, in terms of number of people displaced, area affected, damage dealt (in dollars), and maybe even lives lost.
Which brings me to a point I’m afraid to bring up. Have there been any new estimates on how many people were killed? The mayor of New Orleans estimated that possibly 100,000 people didn’t leave the city. A large number of these people have since arrived at shelters, but I’m afraid that we might see a death toll over ten thousand just for NO. Mississippi might have over a thousand dead when all are counted. Alabama probably won’t have more than a few.
Alive and kickin’, here. I live in East Alabama, and not near the coast. Had a couple of tornadoes near here, but no personal damage. Thanks for asking.
Lots and lots of heads. I heard Bush on the radio this morning: “Nobody expected the levees to break.” Except every single news broadcast in the lead-up to landfall.
This is a complete and total failure of leadership, at all levels.
The heads won’t just roll. They’ll bounce from the force of the decapitation.
Unfortunately, I totally believe that the heads that will roll will be the lowest ones, the ones that really had their hands tied. That’s what usually happens in cases like these. It will be a game of shift the blame.
No-one answered my question. Does anyone know where I can find a map of the areas that are actually flooded?
You could try the maps in this thread.
Oh, come on, how was Bush supposed to know about that? I mean, really, who watches the news when they’re on vacation? :rolleyes:
(I am so unbelievably disillusioned that he was on vacation while most of this was going down, and keep in mind I wasn’t terribly illusioned to begin with.)
Just seconds ago on CNN I watched New Orlean’s Mayor Ray Nagin give a brilliant, moving, impassioned speech on the state of his district. By the end of it, I was in tears, the radio hosts were in tears, and I bet everybody else watching were bawling their eyes out. In fifteen minutes the Mayor laid out his frustrations at the speed of help to the district, explained why there were crazy people running around the city shooting things up and took shots at Bush and the Governor and the war on Iraq. He made me laugh when he challenged other politicians to give NO MORE PRESS CONFERENCES until everything was under control…
It was the most stirring, inspirational thing I had seen since the whole drama began, clearly highlighting the disturbing lack of leadership since the crisis began. Who is in charge right now?