I have attached a few less knee-jerk and more pragmatic responses to the
disaster management failures. If we really want to learn the key lessons 
from the Katrina tragedy, which seems crucial in light of incessant 
hurricane activity, it will be vital to grasp the underlying problems of
disaster mitigation and management.

Benny Peiser
http://www.staff.livjm.ac.uk/spsbpeis/

----------

INTELLIGENCE FAILURE

Science Policy, 4 September 2005
http://sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/prometheus/archives/environment/000555intelligence_failure.html

Roger Pielke Jr.

The Bush Administration's complete lack of preparedness for responding to Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans is one of the most significant intelligence failures in history, ranking right up there with Pearl Harbor and 9/11. It will be important in the coming months for Congress to investigate this policy failure with every bit of effort that it did after 9/11. Let me say that I have every expectation that the government professionals now fully engaged in the rescue and recovery operations will do an outstanding job. The question that needs to be asked, and it is not too soon to begin asking, is why was the federal government so unprepared for the disaster in the face of robust scientific knowledge about the disaster at all time scales? This is especially in light of the fact that the government completely reorganized itself after 9/11 to improve the nation's preparedness and response to catastrophes.

Like many people, I too was buoyed by the reports in the immediate aftermath of Katrina that New Orleans had dodged another bullet. It is understandable that government officials not involved with disaster preparedness and response (including the President) might have seen these reports and felt the same way. But to learn that the federal government agencies responsible for disaster preparation and management had taken very little action in the days and hours before Katrina's landfall to prepare for the possibility of flooding of New Orleans is simply amazing. I study disasters and find this incredible.

Statements by Bush Administration officials reveal the depth of this intelligence failure. Consider the following comments from Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff and FEMA's Michael Brown:

Of Katrina resulting in the failure of the New Orleans levees Chertoff said -- " "That 'perfect storm' of a combination of catastrophes exceeded the foresight of the planners, and maybe anybody's foresight." He called the disaster "breathtaking in its surprise." ... Chertoff argued that authorities actually had assumed that "there would be overflow from the levee, maybe a small break in the levee. The collapse of a significant portion of the levee leading to the very fast flooding of the city was not envisioned."" Wrong. It is now well established that what has occurred was foreseeable and foreseen.

Of the time available to prepare, "Chertoff also argued that authorities did not have much notice that the storm would be so powerful and could make a direct hit on New Orleans." Wrong this storm was forecast perfectly and there were days of notice that an extremely powerful storm would hit along the gulf coast. Forecasts cannot get any better. And again, the disaster has been predicted for 30 years.

Chertoff explains on Wednesday that the government was betting on the come: "... in terms of this storm, particularly because it seemed to move to the east at the last minute, and I remember seeing newspaper headlines that said, you know, New Orleans dodged the bullet, on Tuesday morning, and even as everybody thought New Orleans had dodged the bullet Tuesday morning, the levee was not only being flooded, which is, I think, what most people always assumed would happen, but it actually broke."

Two things here. First, planning for the best case scenario is not a good approach to disaster policy. One wobble in a hurricane's path can make a big difference. And second, the Secretary of DHS was getting his information about the storm's impact on Tuesday from newspaper headlines? Are you kidding me?

Then there is the bizarre episode last Thursday of Chertoff arguing with NPR's Jeremy Siegel about whether or not there were in fact people stranded at the New Orleans Convention Center, and calling the news reports "rumor." Do these folks not watch cable news? Is it possible that I had better intelligence at the foot of the Rockies thousands of miles away than the Secretary of Homeland Security?

Later that day FEMA director Michael Brown told CNN on Thursday that they had only learned of people at the convention center on that day, presumably via the questions put to Chertoff:

"ZAHN: Sir, you aren't just telling me you just learned that the folks at the Convention Center didn't have food and water until today, are you? You had no idea they were completely cut off?

BROWN: Paula, the federal government did not even know about the Convention Center people until today."

Chertoff explains the intelligence failure on Sunday by placing blame on state and local officials:

"Well, I mean, this is clearly something that was disturbing. It was disturbing to me when I learned about it, which came as a surprise. You know, the very day that this emerged in the press, I was on a video conference with all the officials, including state and local officials. And nobody -- none of the state and local officials or anybody else was talking about a Convention Center. The original plan, as I understand it, was to have the Superdome be the place of refuge, of last resort. Apparently, sometime on Wednesday, people started to go to the Convention Center spontaneously. Why it is that there was a breakdown in communication, again, I'm sure will be studied when we get to look at this afterwards. FEMA, of course, did not have large -- is not equipped to put large masses of people into an area. FEMA basically plugs into the existing state and local infrastructure. What happened here was essentially the demolishment of that state and local infrastructure. And I think that really caused a cascading series of breakdowns. I mean, let's be honest. This stressed the system beyond, I think, any prior experience anybody's had in this country."

Let me explain why these comments are significant. Chertoff and Brown are the respective heads of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and within DHS, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). These are the federal agencies with lead responsibility for being prepared for and responding to disasters. Understanding and mitigating risk is their jobs.

This commentary is not a cheap political shot at the Bush Administration. They did have the bad luck of being in office when Katrina stuck, but they are nonetheless accountable for government performance in such situations. And there has been a significant policy failure on their watch. Furthermore, in the aftermath of 9/11 the Bush Administration completely reorganized itself to improve the nation's ability to secure itself. Under this new reorganization, DHS has comprehensively failed its first test. Congress needs to find out why, and fix it. We will have more disasters, that is for sure. The time to start asking hard questions is right now.

================
BUREAUCRATIC FAILURE: TO UNDERSTAND KATRINA'S PROBLEMS, READ THE 9/11 REPORT

The Wall Street Journal, 2 September 2005
http://www.opinionjournal.com/columnists/dhenninger/?id=110007201

BY DANIEL HENNINGER 

	Imagination is not a gift usually associated with bureaucracies.
		--The 9/11 Commission Report

The response to Hurricane Katrina suggests we are not very good at it. The stark images of bereft people in New Orleans and Mississippi are said to reveal inadequate preparation by the agents of government--from elected officials to bureaucracies--whose duties include commanding the vast resources and authority of government to provide help when it is most needed. 

To be sure, the scale of Katrina's force and devastation overwhelms the notion of a rationally organized response. The grim fact remains that disasters are relatively commonplace in the world. Swiss Re, the big reinsurance group, annually publishes a compendium called "Natural catastrophes and man-made disasters" listing the human and economic toll. In 2004, it recorded 116 natural catastrophes, with the Dec. 26 Asian tsunami leaving more than 280,000 dead or missing. Less well-remembered, often the case with Third World disaster, a June monsoon killed 1,845 in Bangladesh and Hurricane Jeanne in September left some 3,000 dead in Haiti, whose flooded city of Gonaives looked like New Orleans. 

An industry of experts has emerged, dedicated to mitigating disasters, both their imminence and aftermath. Science magazine just dedicated its cover to "Dealing with Disasters." We know quite a lot. 

Specialists in disaster mitigation hold annual conferences to share knowledge. In January in Japan, the U.N. held the five-day World Conference on Disaster Reduction, with numerous representatives from member states. A week earlier in Mauritius, Secretary-General Kofi Annan called for "a global warning system" for tsunamis and "all other threats." Specialized disaster Web sites exist, such as the Pan American Health Organization's site on Disasters and Humanitarian Assistance." The U.S. oceanographic administration has created the Center for Tsunami Inundation Mapping Efforts, a sophisticated modeling program to help vulnerable nations in the Pacific. 
 
So if we're so smart, why are Louisiana and Mississippi sinking beneath water and red tape? 
It has been reported in past days how the relief agencies, such as the Army Corps of Engineers and FEMA are struggling; basics such as food distribution are in disarray. On paper anyway, many of these problems had already been addressed. By law, FEMA requires all states, if they are to receive grant money, to file both pre- and post-catastrophe mitigation plans. Experts in Louisiana, and indeed New Orleans, have been drafting one for several years. 

We know what to do. We have many specialists in the arcane disciplines relevant to understanding natural and man-made disasters. We know what to do, but we are not good at using what we know. Why not? 

We fail to use well what we know because we rely too much on large public bureaucracies. This was the primary lesson of the 9/11 Commission Report. Large public bureaucracies, whether the FBI and the CIA or FEMA and the Corps of Engineers, don't talk to each other much. They are poorly incentivized, if at all. Budgets, the oxygen of the acronymic planets, make bureaucracy's managers first responders to constant political whim. Real-world problems, as the 9/11 report noted, inevitably seem distant and minor: "Once the danger has fully materialized, evident to all, mobilizing action is easier--but it then may be too late." 

Homeland Security, a new big bureaucracy, has struggled since 2001 to assemble a feasible plan to respond to another major terror event inside the U.S. The possibility, or likelihood, of a bird-borne flu pandemic is beginning to reach public awareness, but the government is at pains to create a sufficient supply of vaccine or a distribution system for anti-viral medicines. Any bets on which will come first--the flu or the distribution system? 

Big public bureaucracies are going to get us killed. They already have. One may argue that this is an inevitable result of living in an advanced and complex democracy. Yes, up to a point. An open political system indeed breeds inefficiencies (though possibly the Jeb Bush administration that dealt with the 2004 hurricanes is more competent than Gov. Blanco's team in Louisiana). And perhaps low-lying, self-indulgent New Orleans understood its losing bargain with a devil's fate. 

But we ought to at least recognize that our increasingly tough First World problems--terrorism, viruses, the rising incidence of powerful natural disasters--are being addressed by a public sector that too often is coming to resemble a Third World that can't execute. 

I'll go further. We should consider outsourcing some of these functions, for profit, to the private sector. In recent days, offers of help have come from such companies as Anheuser-Busch and Culligan (water), Lilly, Merck and Wyeth (pharmaceuticals), Nissan and GM (cars and trucks), Sprint, Nextel and Qwest (communications gear and phone cards), Johnson & Johnson (toiletries and first aid), Home Depot and Lowe's (manpower). Give contract authority to organize these resources to a project-management firm like Bechtel. Use the bureaucracies as infantry. 
 
A public role is unavoidable and political leadership is necessary. But if we're going to live with First World threats, such as the destruction of a major port city, let's deploy the most imaginative First World brains--in the private sector and academia--to mitigate those threats. Laughably implausible? Look at your TV screen. The status quo isn't funny. 

======
REVIEW OF HURRICANE EVACUATION PLANS AND POLICIES IN THE U.S.

Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Volume 37, Issue 3 , March 2003, Pages 257-275 
http://tinyurl.com/d3z9f

National review of hurricane evacuation plans and policies: a comparison and contrast of state practices 

Elba Urbina a), and Brian Wolshon b) 

a) Chiang, Patel, & Yerby, 1820 Regal Row, Suite 200, Dallas, TX 75235, USA
b) Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, LSU Hurricane Center, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA 70803, USA 

Abstract
The events of recent hurricane seasons have made evacuation a leading emergency management issue. In 1998 and 1999, Hurricanes Georges and Floyd precipitated the two largest evacuations in the history of the United States and perhaps, its two largest traffic jams. In response to the problems experienced during these events, many state departments' of transportation have begun to take a more active role in the planning, management, and operation of hurricane evacuations. This is somewhat of a departure from prior practice when emergency management officials directed these tasks almost exclusively. Since the involvement of transportation professionals in the field of evacuation has been a fairly recent development, many of the newest practices and policies have only been used once, if ever. They also vary widely from state-to-state. To determine what the latest policies and strategies are and how they differed from one location to another, a national review of evacuation plans and practices was recently undertaken. The study was carried out from a transportation perspective and included both a review of the traditional transportation literature and a survey of department of transportation and emergency management officials in coastal states threatened by hurricanes. This paper highlights the findings of the survey portion of the study. It focuses mainly on current state practices, including the use of reverse flow operations and intelligent transportation systems. It also summarizes current evacuation management policies, methods of information exchange, and decision-making criteria. This paper presents the general similarities and differences in practices and gives particular attention to unique, innovative, and potentially useful practices used in individual states. 

doi:10.1016/S0965-8564(02)00015-0       
Copyright © 2003 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved. 

============
PUBLIC ORDERS AND PERSONAL OPINIONS: U.S. HOUSEHOLD STATEGIES FOR HURRICANE RISK ASSESSMENT
      
Global Environmental Change Part B: Environmental Hazards, Volume 2, Issue 4 , December 2000, Pages 143-155 
http://tinyurl.com/d5cfd
 
Public orders and personal opinions: household strategies for hurricane risk assessment 
Kirstin Dow,  and Susan L. Cutter 
Department of Geography, University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC 29208, USA 

Abstract
This paper examines the relationship between household evacuation decisions and official emergency management practices in light of recent increases in the availability and diversity of hurricane-related information. While we focus on Hurricane Floyd in South Carolina, we incorporate findings of our longitudinal research effort covering the last four years and six post-1995 hurricane threats to the state. While only 64% of residents in the mandatory evacuation zone complied with the Hurricane Floyd evacuation order, over 80% agreed that calling an evacuation was an appropriate precautionary response given the uncertainties of the storm. Longitudinal surveys indicate that Horry County residents have developed a fairly robust strategy in making evacuation decisions. This "hurricane savvy" population depends more heavily on individuals' assessments of risks than on official orders. Individual assessment practices differ from official orders in that greater weight is given to household circumstances and preferences, the diligent monitoring of a variety of information sources, and the incorporation of past experiences into the decision-making process. Surveys indicate differences between the general public and officials in terms of priorities and preferences about hurricane evacuations. The public demands more information about the hurricane threat. Officials place more emphasis on planning evacuation routes and public safety measures. 

doi:10.1016/S1464-2867(01)00014-6       
Copyright © 2001 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved. 

=============
HEADING FOR HIGHER GROUND: FACTORS EFFECTING HURRICANE EVACUATION BEHAVIOUR

Global Environmental Change Part B: Environmental Hazards, Volume 2, Issue 4 , December 2000, Pages 133-142 
http://tinyurl.com/a6qrl
      
Heading for higher ground: factors affecting real and hypothetical hurricane evacuation behavior*1 

John C. Whitehead a), Bob Edwards b), Marieke Van Willigen b), John R. Maiolo b), Kenneth Wilson b) and Kevin T. Smith a) 

a) Department of Economics, East Carolina University, Brewster Building, Greenville, NC 27858-4353, USA
b) Department of Sociology, East Carolina University, Brewster Building, Greenville, NC 27858-4353, USA 

Abstract
The purpose of this paper is to assess the determinants of hurricane evacuation behavior of North Carolina coastal households during Hurricane Bonnie and a future hypothetical hurricane. We use the data from a telephone survey of North Carolina coastal residents. Hypothetical questions are used to assess whether respondents will evacuate and where in the case of a future hurricane with varying intensities. We examine the social, economic, and risk factors that affect the decisions to evacuate and whether to go to a shelter or motel/hotel relative to other destinations. The most important predictor of evacuation is storm intensity. Households are more likely to evacuate when given evacuation orders, when they perceive a flood risk, and when they live in mobile homes. Households who own pets are less likely to evacuate. Non-white households, pet owners and those with more education are less likely to go to either a motel/hotel or shelter, preferring instead to stay with friends or family. 
 
doi:10.1016/S1464-2867(01)00013-4       
Copyright © 2001 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.