Thursday, September 08, 2005

An Intriguing Find

Via Two Babes and a Brain. Bob's link provides a map to those counties (listed in red) that were included in an August 26 Statement on Federal Emergency Assistance for Louisiana. Southern Louisiana was not included - namely areas including New Orleans and the delta/bayou parishes.

It is a clear oversight not to include all Louisiana parishes as of the August 26 statement. However, this was to mobilize federal efforts before the storm for relief once the storm passed. It is possible that the federal government realized that prepositioning materials and personnel in the areas south of New Orleans would quite possibly mean the total loss of those personnel and materials given that as of the time notice was made, the storm was projected to be a direct hit on New Orleans as a Category 5 storm. It would not make sense to preposition people directly in harms' way on low lying ground with an expectation of a devastating storm surge.

One of the commenters at TBB notes that there was a August 27 statement that specifically mentions the coastal regions of Louisiana.

As always, things have to be taken in context. Not making excuses here folks.

This is the August 29 statement, which is after the storm hit.

More to follow...

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