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Tourists Realize They're Afterthought, Band Together
The Associated Press ^ | 09-02-05 0315EDT | Robert Tanner

Posted on 09/02/2005 12:58:04 AM PDT by BenLurkin

NEW ORLEANS (AP) - First the federal government took the buses they had hired to evacuate them. Then their hotels turned them out onto the desolate streets.

They trudged for blocks to walk over a bridge, but officers wouldn't let them cross - and fired a few warning shots over their heads to convince them.

And the night was coming down.

Despairing, dozens of trapped tourists huddled on a downtown street corner and waited for dark.

"I grew up in an upper-middle class family. Street life is foreign to me," said Larry Mitzel, 53, of Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. "I'm not sure I'm going to get out of here alive."

The fate of tourists in dozens of hotels here was caught up in the days of chaos and confusion that came after Hurricane Katrina's 145 mph winds.

Many smaller hotels shut down. The largest housed hundreds and hundreds of guests and took in refugees from the storm. How many remained Thursday was unclear.

Tourists and hotel managers alike condemned government officials for ignoring them.

"The tourists are an afterthought here," said Bill Hedrick of Houston, who came to town on business and was trapped with his wife and elderly mother-in-law.

"We're appalled," said Jill Johnson, 53, of Saskatoon. "This city is built on tourism and we're their last priority."

Peter Ambros, general manager of the Astor Crowne Plaza in the French Quarter, said, "Guests who bring business to the hotels are treated 10 times worse than the people at the Superdome."

He helped arrange the hiring of 10 buses to evacuate 500 guests from his and a nearby hotel - at a cost of $25,000.

Then the Federal Emergency Management Agency commandeered the buses and police told the guests to go to the nearby convention center, where a crowd left without food, water or security was growing angry.

Instead, the tourists - dragging their rolling luggage through broken glass, smashed bricks and trash - tried to cross a huge bridge blocks away.

They were turned back when another group trying to cross began to threaten the officers, said Whit Herndon, 32, of Jonesboro, Ark.

As night approached, the tourists stuck close together on a corner of the downtown waterfront and within sight of a police gathering point.

Officers brought them food and water and promised buses would come for them. Most prepared to sleep, sheltered by a concrete overhang.

The tourists put on a game face and prepared to sleep.

Ann Robertson, a 50-year-old vocational counselor from Nashville, Tenn., looked on the bright side. They had food, there was safety in numbers - but then she looked at the sky.

"I don't know," she said, "I never slept on the street before."


TOPICS: News/Current Events; US: Louisiana
KEYWORDS: fema; hurricaneaussies; katrina; neworleans; tourism
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To: BenLurkin

"Jill, respectfully ma'am -- its (American) citizens are the city's first priority."

good, if we can expect the same of other countries, we can finally get rid of all the natalie halloway threads


61 posted on 09/02/2005 1:52:47 AM PDT by KneelBeforeZod ( I'm going to open Cobra Kai dojos all over this valley!)
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To: justa-hairyape
That looks like the CNN number.

It's the ACTUAL number of people who are in the AstroDome at this very minute.

They are not going to take anymore; you might have been told they were going to take 25,000 but they have changed their mind.

62 posted on 09/02/2005 1:54:04 AM PDT by Howlin (Have you check in on this thread: FYI: Hurricane Katrina Freeper SIGN IN Thread)
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To: Howlin

How exactly, you said yourself he didn't know.

Where's the lie?


63 posted on 09/02/2005 1:54:05 AM PDT by HarryCaul
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To: Howlin

How exactly, you said yourself he didn't know.

Where's the lie?


64 posted on 09/02/2005 1:54:33 AM PDT by HarryCaul
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To: Siouxz
If it was ME, however, I'd have been long gone out of Dodge before that happened.

Any reasonably healthy person can walk twenty-five miles in a day on flat ground. They had two full days of beautiful weather, in full knowledge of what was coming, and still didn't get the hell out of there.

-ccm

65 posted on 09/02/2005 1:56:35 AM PDT by ccmay (Question Diversity)
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To: HarryCaul

He didn't know because there was nothing TO know; it's not an official site and he only heard late yesterday afternoon that there were people hanging out there.

You tried to characterize it as if there was a shelter that FEMA didn't know about.


66 posted on 09/02/2005 1:56:46 AM PDT by Howlin (Have you check in on this thread: FYI: Hurricane Katrina Freeper SIGN IN Thread)
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To: Howlin
Sorry, if I offended you, but I've OD'd on watching bad people behave badly the past few days, with no condemnation from local authorities (and certainly no action)!

Having been a tourist many times myself and having been stranded in similar circumstances, I empathize.
67 posted on 09/02/2005 1:57:05 AM PDT by singfreedom ("Victory at all costs,.......for without victory there is no survival."--Churchill--that's "Winston")
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To: Howlin
No, they are not; they're too busy saying "Why wasn't there any food or water at the Convention Center?"

The media makes it out as though they are the same building

The fact that they are not and really 2 DIFFERENT buildings totally changing the argument of blaming FEMA

I know I shouldn't be surprised at this with the Media

But IMO .. they just stepped to a new low

68 posted on 09/02/2005 1:58:50 AM PDT by Mo1
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To: BenLurkin

Unfortunate, but true: Tourist dont vote in our elections. Hence their last place standing.


69 posted on 09/02/2005 2:00:06 AM PDT by truemiester (I could never be a democrat - I've never had anything happen to me that would make me a victim!)
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To: Howlin
They are not going to take anymore; you might have been told they were going to take 25,000 but they have changed their mind.

Okay. So they were able to move 11,000 people in 24 hours. That is what about 110 buses ? I wonder if evacuees now have to be decontaminated ? IE - Disease threat now real. The Astro Dome has no way to decontaminate right now ? Thus when decontaminate order was issued, Astro Dome influx stopped ?

70 posted on 09/02/2005 2:00:14 AM PDT by justa-hairyape
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To: MarMema
There were news reports of tourists who could not get onto a flight out and all the rental cars were taken.

When were the FIRST warnings that Katrina would most likely hit that area? I beleive it was the middle of last week. (could be wrong, but...)

Besides planes & rental cars - there are also trains & buses. Furthermore, the hotels themselves could have/ should have arranged with bus companies to evacuate the tourists long before an order was given to do so.

I can, in the back of my mind, understand a homeowner who decides to stay and ride out the storm. I can NOT fathom a tourist WITH family hanging around.

Having said that - even if some were trapped - what makes THEM any more "special" than any of the other survivors who likewise need evacuation??

Queue up, wait like everyone else and quit yer bitchen . . .

71 posted on 09/02/2005 2:00:19 AM PDT by An.American.Expatriate (Here's my strategy on the War against Terrorism: We win, they lose. - with apologies to R.R.)
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To: Howlin

No, I didn't. I tried to characterize it as a place with thousands of people needing help that FEMA didn't know about, and that it was.

FEMA's job is to find people who need help and render that help. That's the job. They can do it, or they can't.



72 posted on 09/02/2005 2:00:45 AM PDT by HarryCaul
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To: justa-hairyape

It doesn't have anything to do with decontaminate; they just cannot handle anymore people.


73 posted on 09/02/2005 2:01:36 AM PDT by Howlin (Have you check in on this thread: FYI: Hurricane Katrina Freeper SIGN IN Thread)
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To: HarryCaul
FEMA's job is to find people who need help and render that help.

No, it's not; they don't just ride around looking for wherever people have gathered and dump food and water; it has to be staffed and guarded, especially down there.

If you don't think so, you should hear the doctors who were in the SuperDome and left and are now refusing to go back.

74 posted on 09/02/2005 2:03:17 AM PDT by Howlin (Have you check in on this thread: FYI: Hurricane Katrina Freeper SIGN IN Thread)
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To: An.American.Expatriate
Whenever the first warnings were, the tourists were forced to compete with the evacuating residents.

Tourists have homes and jobs to return to, unlike the locals who require food and water. Getting the tourists out makes perfect sense, because it saves resources.

75 posted on 09/02/2005 2:05:03 AM PDT by MarMema
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Laura Brown, a Federal Aviation Administration spokeswoman in Washington, said she had no such report.

"We're controlling every single aircraft in that airspace and none of them reported being fired on," she said, adding that the FAA was in contact with the military as well as civilian aircraft.

http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory?id=1087205


Please pass on this information and add some fact to this rumor.


76 posted on 09/02/2005 2:05:52 AM PDT by redder
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To: Howlin

So we agree, FEMA can't find people and render assistance.

Look, I thing Nagin is doing a terrible job. NOPD, worse than terrible, as a force, though I'm sure individuals stand out. Blanco is totally useless. But FEMA is blowing it too, and there's nothing wrong with saying that.

If your emergency plans depend on everyone going where you expect them to in an orderly fashion, you just aren't very familiar with the American people. That's not what we do. And if your plans need that, they're bad plans.

This is the real world, this is what has to be dealt with.

When those dirty bombs start going off, do you think this kind of organization is going to work?

We need real plans. We don't seem to have them.


77 posted on 09/02/2005 2:08:03 AM PDT by HarryCaul
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To: HarryCaul
FEMA's job is to find people who need help and render that help.

Fema's job is to manage federal assistance during disasters, etc. The state should be the frontline.

78 posted on 09/02/2005 2:08:37 AM PDT by MarMema
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To: redder
You know what .. they said the siege on the hospitals was a rumor also and not true

Guess what .. they reported that wrong

I think I'll wait for someone else besides ABC/AP to report on that part of the story
79 posted on 09/02/2005 2:12:53 AM PDT by Mo1
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To: singfreedom
I'm afraid that if my hotel had HIRED me a bus and some government dope decided some ne're-do-well, bottom feeding scumbag, crawled out of the trees with an AK47, should have my bus because the "scum" might riot, I'd be REAL pis*ed. Has the world gone crazy? You cave in to these jerks because you're afraid of what they might do? Me thinks their dogs need training!

You obviously missed my point.

FEMA is in charge of getting EVERYBODY out. Priorities must exist in such a situation - kind of like the old women and children first traditions on the high seas. To borrow from "Titanic" - just because someone can afford to pay for a bus trip does NOT give him the right to be evac'd before the rest of the "scum".

Let me ask you a hypothetical question. Assume that you and your family were trapped at the dome and the authorities are asking you to be patient, a bus will arrive soon so that you too can be evac'd. You are out of food and water and the mob around you is "irratable". Then you see a chartered bus full of tourists leaving the city BEFORE you. What would your reaction to that be? What of that of the "mob"?

Is it so hard to understand that some semblance of "fairness" must prevail in order to keep the mob from rioting? Or would you like to be on a bus and attacked by the angry mob? Furthermore - how many additional security forces will be necessary to ensure the safety of the passengers of chartered bus?

Mobs are strange. They "cause" otherwise sane people to do things they might never have conceived of doing otherwise.

IMHO - those that are caught looting/shooting need to be shot on sight (or at least rendered harmless and held separtely from the others AND be the last ones out!). However, bringing order in the chaos is no easy job, and, ANY action that is not a part of the "orderly" evacutation needs to be prohibited.

80 posted on 09/02/2005 2:16:23 AM PDT by An.American.Expatriate (Here's my strategy on the War against Terrorism: We win, they lose. - with apologies to R.R.)
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