Hurricane Katrina

[Brent Burns]

The aftermath of Katrina would not only impact our country, but the impact would be felt world-wide.

My biggest worry right now is how we are going to handle disease-borne infections, gastrointestinal, etc., etc. I really do shudder when thinking about the dead bodies in the southern parts of the Gulf States. Hate to bring that up, but that is a fact. This reminds me of the Galveston storm of 1900 where the folks had no choice but create human pyres. I just hope that that would not affect the lax players from Tulane and Loyola of New Orleans. Tarzan, I am sure it would not have much medical/health impacts on the LSU and NSU guys, hmm... You can give me a virtual bop on the arm for saying that you don't want me to worry you...

[lil lady lax fan]

lil lady lax fan, Interesting video that counters that opinion on www.foxnews.com

Science of Storms
Is global warming to blame for Hurricane Katrina?

The scientist dismisses the claim that storms are supercharged due to Global Warming....Higher temp = El Nino which weakens storms. Too many factors to place blame in one direction or another.

I was only joking about that, really. There are a lot more factors involved in the formation of hurricanes and storm systems. There have been an increase, though, in the number of violent weather systems in the past decade or so. That may be due to global warming or just a cyclical thing--only time will tell. I just feel we could, as a nation, do more to control the pollution levels. Just my opinion. I know others differ on that.

The oil industries are going to have a heck of a time dealing with their own clean up efforts!

[lil lady lax fan]

My husband sent me this from the Washington Post about Katrina scams. Please make it a point to let folks know about this. It's really pathetic what some folks will do!

http://blogs.washingtonpost.com/securityfix/

[Sonny]

I was talking with a friend at lunch today. Maybe this dicussion is a tad premature, but do you think New Orleans should be rebuilt? I have doubts that any type of levies, canals, etc. could be rebuilt to prevent this disaster from happening again.

I also have issues with the federal government bailing out everyone on the coast (this includes you guys in FLA and California) everytime there is a natural disaster... but that is another issue for another day.

Your thoughts?

[Sonny]

Hundreds -- maybe thousands -- may be dead in New Orleans:
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mp ... ry/3333250

NEW ORLEANS — The mayor said today that Hurricane Katrina probably killed thousands of people in New Orleans.

"We know there is a significant number of dead bodies in the water," and other people dead in attics, Mayor Ray Nagin said. Asked how many, he said: "Minimum, hundreds. Most likely, thousands."

The frightening estimate came as Army engineers struggled to plug New Orleans' breached levees with giant sandbags and concrete barriers, while authorities drew up plans to clear out the tens of thousands of people left in New Orleans and all but abandon the flooded-out city.

There will be a "total evacuation of the city. We have to. The city will not be functional for two or three months," Nagin said.

[mbuff]

Billy,

Glad to hear that y'all made in through in Thib. I was down in Plaquemines fishing. Flew into MSY on Friday morning and supposed to fly out Sunday at 7:30pm.

Got a whole 4 hours of fishing done but did not hit the blue water. We were at the Suburban Rod&Gun Club which does not exist anymore. Since the airlines cancelled all flights out Sat night, we ended up wahooing a Yukon and driving back to Texas. Thank God for a wonderful lady in NO who had more vehicles than her family could get out. We just have her cell number and can't get ahold of her but we still have her car.

I tried to call you on your cell but could not raise you at the time. NO was a little crazy Sat afternoon. But in keeping with the traditions of the coon assed, we did have 2 cases of beer and 2/3 a gallon of rum with us that we "evacuated" from the boat so we were provisioned for the trip.

I have not seen nor heard of anything out of Plaquemines but I did see a picture of St.Bernard and it looks very very bad.

How about everybody else at NSU? I don't know about Tulane, reports were that Uptown was not underwater but I guess if you can't get there, what's the point? Have not heard much about Xavier, UNO, Loyola.

Regards and stay safe,
Buff

[ZagGrad]

I also have issues with the federal government bailing out everyone on the coast (this includes you guys in FLA and California) everytime there is a natural disaster... but that is another issue for another day.

I have thoughts about this exact same issue. Some of it is directed at the people that keep choosing to live in these types of places. Why come back and rebuild after it's all been destroyed--sometimes several times.

[TexOle]

SMU is also hosting students from Tulane. I guess they were all sent to Jackson, Mississippi. Then they were sent to Dallas or Atlanta. The football team is at SMU. My cousin was supposed to start at Tulane this fall. I wonder when they will start back up.

In response to rebuilding New Orleans I have a few thoughts. People should be allowed to live where they want. Obviously there are a few exceptions to that. The problem is that the insurance companies could be in trouble for this disaster. Should the government bail them out? If we know this is possible should we insure those places?

[lil lady lax fan]

To Sonny's question:

I think the only viable option would be to rebuild on higher ground. New Orleans and its culture would be a terrible thing to lose. Kind of makes you realize why some ancient cultures chose to abandon some of their original settlements...


A reminder to everyone, if you can, make it a point to visit your local blood bank. Not only will the Red Cross be needing monetary donations, but also blood donations to help the injured from this catastrophe.

[Brent Burns]

I think the only viable option would be to rebuild on higher ground. New Orleans and its culture would be a terrible thing to lose. Kind of makes you realize why some ancient cultures chose to abandon some of their original settlements...

Let's see...

Pompeii (totally submerged by Mt. Vesvius)

the Mayan civilization in South America (the folks moved on...)

Troy (probably fictional, but there was a site similar to Troy on the western edge of Turkey which once was called Antalonia and Asia Minor)


New Orleans?? I am pretty sure the Big Easy will still be around, but the way the city looks will be much different than it used to be, e.g. the French Quarter. I even saw a picture of that street prior to Katrina's fury and the day after picture where some cars were crushed by bricks.

It is true that we humans are restless wanderers, so the folks would probably move on to other places away from the ocean.

[Brent Burns]

I just discovered that there are several categories of message boards for Hurricane Katrina at Yahoo, and there are several MBs for colleges & universities in NO: Tulane, Loyola, Xavier, and UNO. I can not remember exactly which MB it was, but a college student chimed in and stated that he or she is hoping that the professor would grant an extension because his backpack floated away with the chemistry assignments. Anyway, I thought this would be good info for the students from Tulane, Loyola, Xavier, Univ of New Orleans to know about those MBs.

So far, I noticed that Nicholls State University's, Xavier University's and Loyola's websites are down as we all know the power is down. However, Tulane's website does not have any pictures, but just announcements as to what Tulane is doing for its college community. Like what others said, the senior leadership is now in Jackson, Mississippi until everything is stabilized at Tulane. LSU's website is up and still intact and has a link to getting information.

Totally off the point, I am wondering if anyone on the USLIA board is a ham radio operator.

[Sonny]

Tulane is posting updates on their web site here:
http://emergency.tulane.edu/

[lax]

i go to school at tulane and obviously this is turning out to be really bad.
a bunch of us from the lax team actually roadtripped
it up to Austin cuz one of our buddies lives here and i used to
go to school up the road. people have been nice and we've been
having a good time on 6th street and at lake travis with our
boat. however, all of us are realizing that our semester is pretty much gone and we are all flying back to our hometowns. the news and pictures are pretty devastating and i hate to sound cheesy, but its a pretty insane feeling to have your entire city just kinda wiped out and hear about all the death and destruction. hopefully everybody on our team made it out alright and is safe, but it will be a long time before we can head back home and get our lives back together in new orleans. anyways, thanks for all of your support during this situation and we all cant wait to get some sense of normalcy and stability back in our lives...and of course get back on the field this coming spring. thanks again

[Tarzan]

Random thoughts after Katrina:

After seeing the footage of New Orleans for the first time (my power just came on), I felt like I was watching scenes from a Midwestern flood until I look close and see places that I know. Watching them scan over the area near the site of the Mardi Gras lacrosse tournament and home field of my NOLC, I realize that some of my favorite places are under 10+ feet of water.

Watching Dateline, hearing Aaron Neville sing “Amazing Grace” while the footage of victims is flashed, I hear my wife start to cry.

In the same story I watch the kids play on the field in which their hero’s battle on Sunday. I hope it gave them a little sweetness on the bitter apple they have had to swallow in the last couple of days.

Receiving pictures of the Southern part of my Parish and gazing in disbelief when I see the picture of the bridge leading to the camp where I slept last weekend….The bridge leads to the gulf now.

We knew it was coming, we warned the federal government, and we even wore life-vests while visiting offices of the Congressmen from other States. We told them we were sinking in the Gulf. We told them to fix the wetlands or New Orleans will be underwater. They send us $1 billion over 10 years in the Energy bill from the oil revenues produced off our coast, …..We need 14 Billion to save our wetlands!!!

What I don’t get is $1 billion is a drop in the bucket of oil revenues the feds get off Louisiana’s coast. We drill for oil off our coast and Florida doesn’t. They get the money to fix the Everglades and we get 1/14th of what we need….dollar short and a day late!

[Brent Burns]

Granted, this information is nothing compared to what we have seen on all of the national news companies (ABC, NBC, and CBS) as I just learned that History Channel will air a program just for tomorrow night- "Isaac's Storm". It is about Isaac Cline who was proven wrong when a hurricane totally oblierated most of Galveston, and to date, it is still the most deadliest hurricane where 8,000 people died. Though we still call it the Storm of 1900, some call it "Isaac's Storm." In a way, some folks in Galveston felt that it was necessary to build better seawalls at the time, but if I remember correctly, Isaac did not feel that it was necessary because most folks tend to listen to a meterologist. That show will be on History Channel tomorrow night. In a nutshell, it shows that we humans do make mistakes and we don't really follow through when we should have thought about the possible worse-case scenarios that could happen in the future. After the devastating storm in Galveston, Cline never talked about it the rest of his life.