Posted on 09/08/2008 9:52:52 AM PDT by Graybeard58
The coordination among municipal, state and federal agencies responding to Hurricane Gustav's strike along the central Gulf Coast last week was vastly better than it was for Hurricane Katrina. That's not intended to damn with faint praise, but to acknowledge many, though not all, of the lessons of Katrina were learned.
Perhaps the most impressive performer was Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, who proved himself to be a calm, confident leader. By leading the early, more-or-less orderly evacuation of 1.9 million people, he helped keep the death toll to just six.
New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin, renowned for his ineptitude after Katrina, observed the region "dodged a bullet" when Gustav — surprise, surprise — did not live up to its hype as America's Storm of the Century II. Indeed, with hurricanes Ike and Josephine warming up in the bullpen, Gustav might not even be a finalist for storm of the month.
Rest assured, however, the nation didn't "dodge a bullet," at least not financially. Property damage is expected to be $10 billion, or three times the pre-storm actuarial estimate. On top of that will be the cost of fixing levees, as well as the hundreds of millions in federal relief and the tens of millions in obligatory waste, fraud and graft. The final tally won't approach Katrina's $41 billion, but billions will be spent repairing infrastructure that was fixed after Katrina so it can be damaged or destroyed by the next hurricane.
This is known as "throwing good money after bad," and it's madness even when it's done in the name of compassion. But as long as U.S. taxpayers continue to foot the repair bill, millions of their countrymen will continue to live on the water's edge in the nation's most hurricane-prone places and insist that taxpayers make them whole when their property inevitably gets wrecked.
But oceanfront development also systematically reduces natural hurricane buffers. Geologists say thousands of square yards of southern Louisiana disappear into the gulf every day, which hastens New Orleans' long-predicted demise. Multiply that by all the development that has occurred and continues apace along the eastern seaboard and Gulf Coast, and it's easy to see how enormous taxpayers' potential liability is.
As hurricanes go, Gustav was no Katrina or Andrew, so it remains to be seen if government really can handle a major hurricane. But it's clear many Gustav evacuees were perturbed by the "false alarm." As they streamed back prematurely to Greater New Orleans last week, they vowed never again to be so quick to flee a hurricane. And thus are the seeds of the next "natural disaster," almost entirely of man's making, are planted.
Ping to a Republican-American Editorial.
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I didn’t think an editorial writer had the stones to state
the obivious!
..............New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin, renowned for his ineptitude after Katrina.......................
No, he got a pass!
All the devastation and death was caused by Brownie and BUSH!
I say that we just turn off the tap and let you all find your own gas and oil. The area hit this time was in the Port Fourchon area. It really could have been a lot worse for everyone nationally.
Part of the reason for the increased damages from storm surge is because we allowed drilling in our state and the necessary canals and ship channels to get the oil and gas out sped up the coastal erosion.
One thing that has been learned......if you live in those areas that consistantly get hit by the hurricanes, you will get a new house every so many years at other people expense.
Wrong. If folks didn't have flood insurance, they didn't get that much at all. They certainly didn't get a new house. I know, because my sister and her husband lost their home to a 35' wave, more than 40 miles from where Katrina made landfall. Their house had been there for over 60 years, and had survived the big hurricane of '47, and Camille, as well. There were homes along the beach in Biloxi and Gulfport that had been there for over 150 years, and had survived many other large, deadly hurricanes, but were destroyed by Katrina.
Katrina was just a freak storm, and one of which I hope we won't see a repeat for many more years.
they should have filled it all in to begin with.
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