Vertical evacuation high on risk

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Vertical evacuation high on risk
Hotels urged not to take in guests during hurricanes
Tuesday, May 24, 2005
By Rebecca Mowbray
Business writer
In a hurricane symposium for hotel operators Monday afternoon at the Ritz Carlton New Orleans hotel, a battalion of public safety officials urged local hoteliers not to take guests during hurricanes because they won't be able to take care of them when the big storm hits.

"I don't encourage vertical evacuation," said Joseph Matthews, chief of the Office of Emergency Preparedness. "In New Orleans, let's face it, there are no safe havens."

But the reality is that for many years New Orleanians have evacuated vertically -- to local high-rise hotels -- rather than face the stress, uncertainty and hassle of trying to get out of town when hurricanes approach. The city does not open shelters; it opens refuges of last resort where people are responsible for their own food.

With the inventory of hotel rooms in the New Orleans area having grown to 38,000, there's greater capacity than ever before for people to try to stay.

Last year during Hurricane Ivan, for example, local hotels ran at 90 percent occupancy, often with three or four people to a room.

"One thing we know for a fact is that you're going to be full for a hurricane whether you want to be or not," said Bill Langkopp, executive vice president of the Greater New Orleans Hotel and Lodging Association. "Vertical evacuation may not be policy, but it's reality."

This debate between safety and reality played out Monday afternoon as more than 100 hotel engineers, and safety and operations specialists gathered to talk about what they learned from the near miss of Hurricane Ivan last fall and how they can make things safer next time.

"We weren't prepared for the hurricane that hit," said Kitty Ratcliffe, who joined the New Orleans Metropolitan Convention and Visitors Bureau as executive vice president after weathering last season's four hurricanes in Florida as head of the Jacksonville Convention and Visitors Bureau. "We want to make sure that we deal with this the right way should it occur again in 2005."

The convention bureau has developed a crisis management plan that it plans to give to all convention groups that meet in the city between July and October, and it is encouraging hotels to streamline their communications with each other when storms threaten so they can work together to make everyone safe.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration predicts that this year there will be 12 to 15 tropical storms, seven to nine hurricanes and three to five hurricanes that are at least a Category 3 on the Saffir-Simpson scale, or storms with winds of 111 mph to 130 mph.

"All the indications are there. It's going to be a very active season," said David Bernard, a WWL-TV meteorologist and speaker at the event. Bernard spoke about how to read hurricane strike predictions and noted that though scientists have gotten better at tracking storms, they still can't predict how strong storms will be when they make landfall.

But public safety officials said they hope there won't be many people that stay in hotels next time, and they painted a dire picture of why they shouldn't.

Local hotels may be strong enough to withstand hurricanes, even though many were built before building codes required them to endure 130 mph winds. But hotel windows, and the frames that hold the windows, may not be able to withstand a hurricane. And upper floors of hotels face stronger winds than lower floors, making high-rises potentially dangerous places to be.

Moreover, if the big one does hit, public safety officials said, hotels might find themselves taking care of guests for a few months rather than a few days, which would require having appropriate amounts of food, water and diesel fuel for generators on hand.

Fire danger also increases during storms because people often try to use candles instead of flashlights. If the city floods, firefighters expect the city to be filled with hazardous waste, some of which could be flammable. Worse, because even the newest firetrucks can make it through only up to 31 inches of water and it's a losing battle to fight fires in winds above 40 mph, the New Orleans Fire Department won't be there to help if there's a problem, Superintendent Charles Parent said.

Public safety officials also rattled off a number of other things for hotel operators to consider. Do they have some sort of safety restraint in case police can't get there to arrest someone? Should they ban sales of alcohol during storms? Can they keep people inside so they won't get hit with flying debris?

"If you're going to house people in a vertical evacuation, you're taking on a tremendous responsibility. You may be housing them for months," said Gary Savelle, chief of the New Orleans Fire Department.

However, after reports that it took 10 hours to make the 80-mile trip to Baton Rouge during the peak of the Hurricane Ivan evacuation last year, it's easy to understand why people decide to stay in a hotel rather than hit the road.

But Matthews said public safety officials hope this year's improved contra-flow evacuation plan will make the decision to leave easier. To set the tone that evacuation is the only way to go, Matthews said the city plans to close schools and government earlier this year.

"We would like you to make it known that you will not take additional guests," said Matthews, who encouraged hoteliers to submit evacuation plans to his office. He also encouraged them to sign contracts with diesel fuel suppliers and bus companies for emergency services if they plan to stay open, or, better yet, try to partner with hotels north of Interstate 12 and get them to agree to take guests if a storm hits.

The hotel association said it can't tell its members to shut down and that if there are guests stranded in hotels, they have a duty to stay open. "I think our role would be to provide all of the information that we heard today so that management can make informed decisions when the time comes," Langkopp said.

But at least one hotel operator said he plans to discourage taking reservations during hurricanes.

Scott Dawson, general manager of the Hotel Inter-Continental, said hoteliers have long felt that it is a community service -- a duty, even -- to provide shelter during the storms. But after participating in Monday's hurricane discussion and one last week in Jefferson Parish, Dawson said he thinks it's not doing anyone any favors to attempt to take on that responsibility.

Whether or not to stay open is not a question of business, because hotels lose money by selling rooms during storms at moderate rates and trying to serve so many people around the clock, Dawson said. It's a question of responsibility to employees and guests.

Next hurricane, Dawson said he thinks he will try to encourage guests and employees to leave, discourage reservations from the community and only take them if people are really stuck as the storm is bearing down on the area.

"You listen to these guys and you start to wonder if this is a wise course of action" to take guests, Dawson said. "It's about what is responsible. I think it's responsible to have as few people remain in the city as possible. Fundamentally, you want to have the hotel empty, because that means that everyone is somewhere else."

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Rebecca Mowbray can be reached at rmowbray@timespicayune.com or (504) 826-3417.