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Florida Lucky-Hurricanes Hit In Election Year
In August of 2004 President Bush approved federal assistance for Hurricane Charley approximately one hour after the storm made landfall. National Guard units, teams of rescuers moved into the affected areas with 11 truckloads of water and 14 truckloads of ice within a day. Supplies and personnel were prepositioned before Charley hit to the tune of 4,000 National Guardsmen.
In September 2004, FEMA's advance preparations for Hurricane Frances were detailed in a memo to included:
Five pharmaceutical caches, containing emergency medical supplies, are being pre-positioned, and are currently en route to Atlanta and Tampa.
FEMA's Mobile Emergency Response Services (MERS) communications staff and equipment are available to provide telephone, radio and video links in support of response and recovery efforts. About 100 MERS personnel and about 75 vehicles – including Mobile Emergency Operations Center (MEOCs) equipped vehicles and Mobile Radio Vans (MRVs) to provide radio capability have been assigned to support Hurricane Frances response and recovery operations.
FEMA teleregistration centers are fully staffed, ready and able to register as many as 20,000 disaster assistance applications per day for affected residents in declared counties. The Internal Revenue Service is providing additional operators to support FEMA’s teleregistration operations, which are currently operating 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
FEMA contract inspectors are ready for activation, with surge capability providing for up to 15,000 inspections per day within 14 days of activation. FEMA is working with the General Services Administration to analyze vacancy rates of various safe housing options (including apartments, homes, RVs, time shares, mobile homes, hotels and motels) as part of pre-planning temporary housing strategies for those whose homes are severely damaged or destroyed.
The American Red Cross has opened more than 250 shelters in Florida that housed approximately 15,500 evacuees last night. Additional shelters have been opened in Georgia and Alabama in case need arises. In North Carolina, the Red Cross is manning state welcome centers to help evacuees with rest stop ministrations.
Two weeks later FEMA prepared for Hurricane Ivan by assembling and prepositioning water,ice, medical supplies, tents and tarps.
President Bush made five storm related visits to Florida in September of 2004. Two weeks after Francis hit a Florida official summarized the response by saying that FEMA handed out housing assistance "to everyone who needed it without asking for much information of any kind."
In contrast Hurricane Katrina hit nearly two years into the lamest lameduck Presidency ever.
Three days after Katrina made landfall, five days after Governor Kathleen Blanco declared a state of emergency in Louisiana, one day after the levees were breeched; President Bush managed to finally make the time to organize a task force to coordinate federal response.
FEMA director Michael Brown waited three days after landfall , hours after the levees broke to finally request the Director of Homeland Security to dispatch one thousand employees to the region and gives those employees two days to get there.
By this time tens of thousands of people were trapped in the Superdome and the Convention Center without food or water and thousands more were drowning in their homes. Three days after landfall the Director of Homeland Security, Michael Chertoff and the Director of FEMA, Michael Brown admitted they were unaware the Convention Center was a shelter that had not been stocked with ANY supplies.
To suggest that "now is not the time to dwell on who is at fault for this atrocity but an investigation should probably be done "sometime in the future" is insane. We are in the peak of hurricane season. We don't need an investigation - we need a President who gives a damn about Americans as human beings, not votes. We need a Director of Homeland Security and a Director of FEMA who understand their responsabilities and can carry them out.
There are three more hurricanes in the Atlantic tonight. What we need is a "firing squad".
For a concise and accurate timeline of Hurricane Katrina and the total lack of immediate response by our government go to Katrina.
Note: The Unites States Coast Guard responded within hours of Katrina's landfall - without waiting for a request, without waiting for orders. One Coast Guard base has rescued twice as many people during the past week as it has in the past fifty years.
In September 2004, FEMA's advance preparations for Hurricane Frances were detailed in a memo to included:
Five pharmaceutical caches, containing emergency medical supplies, are being pre-positioned, and are currently en route to Atlanta and Tampa.
FEMA's Mobile Emergency Response Services (MERS) communications staff and equipment are available to provide telephone, radio and video links in support of response and recovery efforts. About 100 MERS personnel and about 75 vehicles – including Mobile Emergency Operations Center (MEOCs) equipped vehicles and Mobile Radio Vans (MRVs) to provide radio capability have been assigned to support Hurricane Frances response and recovery operations.
FEMA teleregistration centers are fully staffed, ready and able to register as many as 20,000 disaster assistance applications per day for affected residents in declared counties. The Internal Revenue Service is providing additional operators to support FEMA’s teleregistration operations, which are currently operating 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
FEMA contract inspectors are ready for activation, with surge capability providing for up to 15,000 inspections per day within 14 days of activation. FEMA is working with the General Services Administration to analyze vacancy rates of various safe housing options (including apartments, homes, RVs, time shares, mobile homes, hotels and motels) as part of pre-planning temporary housing strategies for those whose homes are severely damaged or destroyed.
The American Red Cross has opened more than 250 shelters in Florida that housed approximately 15,500 evacuees last night. Additional shelters have been opened in Georgia and Alabama in case need arises. In North Carolina, the Red Cross is manning state welcome centers to help evacuees with rest stop ministrations.
Two weeks later FEMA prepared for Hurricane Ivan by assembling and prepositioning water,ice, medical supplies, tents and tarps.
President Bush made five storm related visits to Florida in September of 2004. Two weeks after Francis hit a Florida official summarized the response by saying that FEMA handed out housing assistance "to everyone who needed it without asking for much information of any kind."
In contrast Hurricane Katrina hit nearly two years into the lamest lameduck Presidency ever.
Three days after Katrina made landfall, five days after Governor Kathleen Blanco declared a state of emergency in Louisiana, one day after the levees were breeched; President Bush managed to finally make the time to organize a task force to coordinate federal response.
FEMA director Michael Brown waited three days after landfall , hours after the levees broke to finally request the Director of Homeland Security to dispatch one thousand employees to the region and gives those employees two days to get there.
By this time tens of thousands of people were trapped in the Superdome and the Convention Center without food or water and thousands more were drowning in their homes. Three days after landfall the Director of Homeland Security, Michael Chertoff and the Director of FEMA, Michael Brown admitted they were unaware the Convention Center was a shelter that had not been stocked with ANY supplies.
To suggest that "now is not the time to dwell on who is at fault for this atrocity but an investigation should probably be done "sometime in the future" is insane. We are in the peak of hurricane season. We don't need an investigation - we need a President who gives a damn about Americans as human beings, not votes. We need a Director of Homeland Security and a Director of FEMA who understand their responsabilities and can carry them out.
There are three more hurricanes in the Atlantic tonight. What we need is a "firing squad".
For a concise and accurate timeline of Hurricane Katrina and the total lack of immediate response by our government go to Katrina.
Note: The Unites States Coast Guard responded within hours of Katrina's landfall - without waiting for a request, without waiting for orders. One Coast Guard base has rescued twice as many people during the past week as it has in the past fifty years.
