It will take months and maybe years to fully comprehend what happened to New Orleans on Aug. 29, as Hurricane Katrina battered the city and the levees were breached. Nothing quite like it has ever happened to a major American city. New Orleans hasn?t merely been evacuated for a week or so; it has, in the words of one headline, been ?left for the dead,? perhaps for months to come. But as we struggle to understand the lessons of Katrina, here are two places to begin: It?s important how we get people out of threatened cities, and it?s equally important how they come back.
Katrina was different from other great hurricanes like Andrew, which devastated Miami in 1992, because the hurricane?s winds and rains did not ravage New Orleans as much as its aftermath: the breaching of the levees, which flooded the city with water that, in some neighborhoods, rose at the rate of a foot a minute. It was the flood, not the wind and rain, that made New Orleans uninhabitable.
Many were shocked to learn that 20 percent of residents did not or could not heed the mayor?s mandatory evacuation order. But people who know about natural disasters weren?t surprised. While most families pack up and leave at first warning, a sizeable number don?t ? because they never hear the warnings, can?t leave due to infirmity or lack of individual transportation, or refuse to go because they fear leaving more than the storm.
Chillingly, in similar circumstances, other cities would not do much better than New Orleans. In the Tampa/St. Petersburg area, disaster experts watched the scenes from Louisiana with foreboding. ?A worst-case evacuation tells us 487,000 people in Hillsborough County [where Tampa is located] alone would have to seek shelter. Out of Pinellas County [St. Petersburg], 550,000 people,? one expert told the Tampa Tribune. ?Between the two counties … we?d put a million people on the road. Those pictures we saw of New Orleans, we?re looking at Tampa.?
And what about Tampa Bay?s aged, infirm and poor? At this point, Tampa wouldn?t do better than New Orleans at getting them out. Reason: It doesn?t know where they are. (There is an evacuation registry that people can sign up for, but relatively few do.)
One thing Tampa and other cities could do better, of course, is identify safe places in the city and have provisions for protecting and feeding people in those shelters. Still, getting people out of their homes and into the shelters with, at most, a two-day warning would be a logistical nightmare. And, again, not all would make even that short journey.
The other great lesson we?ll learn from Katrina will be how to repopulate a city. New Orleans will be rebuilt, of course; culturally and economically, it?s too important not to be. (Among other things, a port near the mouth of the Mississippi is crucial to agriculture and manufacturing. And then there?s the oil and gas industry.) But how many New Orleans residents will return after spending months elsewhere? And when they come back, will they bring their city?s culture and breezy attitude? We?ll know on Tuesday, Feb. 28, 2006, when Mardi Gras is held.
ArchPundit