Rain Gryphon (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
rain_gryphon) wrote2005-09-03 05:25 am
rain_gryphon) wrote2005-09-03 05:25 am
Entry tags:
Unhalfbricking
I'm a bit non-plussed by all of the people popping up to proclaim that the stay-behinds in New Orleans should have been evacuated by the government. That's one of those really good plans like "divert the hurricane" or "plug the holes in the seawall". No one seems to pause to consider how they'd be moved, or where they'd be put.
There aren't that many roads leading into New Orleans. It's on that little peninsula, amidst the swamps. When they realized Saturday that they needed to get everyone out of there, they opened up all lanes to be outbound. There's no chance of getting buses in for an evacuation until the outflowing traffic's abated.
By late Sunday morning, that would have been possible. What then? You've got maybe 12 hours until the storm starts. There aren't nearly enough buses to move everyone all at once. It's going to need five or six trips per bus at least. That sharply limits the operational range. It's not just enough to get people a mile or two over the river so they're "outside New Orleans" - there's a huge storm coming, and they need shelter. Given the range constraints, and the fact that north is the only practical direction for an evacuation, dumping people in and around Baton Rouge is the only real choice that you have.
What will you do with them in Baton Rouge? School auditoriums are notorious for falling apart in high winds, and per Sunday's forecast, there was a Force Five hurricane barrelling north, with 175mph winds. The hotels are filled from the Saturday exodus. Baton Rouge may have some sort of sports stadium, but I'll wager it's not going to hold all the people that the SuperDome will, nor is it likely as fortress-like in its construction.
The SuperDome itself is remarkably sturdy and overdesigned, though. Even if the entire roof comes off, the walls will stand by themselves, and continue to give shelter from the wind. The SuperDome is also high enough that the water simply isn't going to rise to the top levels. Evacuating on Sunday means moving the refugees to something inherently less sturdy and not very far removed from where they started, when catastrophic winds are expected.
Given what we know from hindsight, they might have been better off that way. Given the information that was available at the time, that would have been criminal.
*****
Bwahahahah!
There aren't that many roads leading into New Orleans. It's on that little peninsula, amidst the swamps. When they realized Saturday that they needed to get everyone out of there, they opened up all lanes to be outbound. There's no chance of getting buses in for an evacuation until the outflowing traffic's abated.
By late Sunday morning, that would have been possible. What then? You've got maybe 12 hours until the storm starts. There aren't nearly enough buses to move everyone all at once. It's going to need five or six trips per bus at least. That sharply limits the operational range. It's not just enough to get people a mile or two over the river so they're "outside New Orleans" - there's a huge storm coming, and they need shelter. Given the range constraints, and the fact that north is the only practical direction for an evacuation, dumping people in and around Baton Rouge is the only real choice that you have.
What will you do with them in Baton Rouge? School auditoriums are notorious for falling apart in high winds, and per Sunday's forecast, there was a Force Five hurricane barrelling north, with 175mph winds. The hotels are filled from the Saturday exodus. Baton Rouge may have some sort of sports stadium, but I'll wager it's not going to hold all the people that the SuperDome will, nor is it likely as fortress-like in its construction.
The SuperDome itself is remarkably sturdy and overdesigned, though. Even if the entire roof comes off, the walls will stand by themselves, and continue to give shelter from the wind. The SuperDome is also high enough that the water simply isn't going to rise to the top levels. Evacuating on Sunday means moving the refugees to something inherently less sturdy and not very far removed from where they started, when catastrophic winds are expected.
Given what we know from hindsight, they might have been better off that way. Given the information that was available at the time, that would have been criminal.
*****
Bwahahahah!
no subject
For some reason I think of Cye being the most likely canidate for car steppage.
no subject
2003: There's going to be a really big hurricane in a couple of years. Get out now.
2004: There's going to be a huge hurricane soon. You need to leave. Being poor is no excuse, we warned you two years ago. You could've walked to a safe distance by now. There's still a chance if you leave now.
2005: There's going to be a huge hurricane. We warned you, we warned the federal government. It's probably too late for many of the poor people to leave, and there's no way we can evacuate all of them now because there's so many of them. You're all going to die.
2005, later: We told you so. Didn't you learn anything from all of those rich Floridians in the Keys who wanted to "ride it out?"
I think that prettymuch sums it up.