vbhoutex wrote:The evac that we had in the Houston area was necessary. You can't leave hundreds of thousands of people in harms way waiting to see if the storm is actually going to hit you head on. It takes way to long to evac the surge prone areas to wait. It is a damned if you do damned if you don't scenario. If the public officials had not ordered the evacs and Rita had hit the Houston area head on or to our West a little heads would be rolling for not doing the right thing. The biggest problem with the evacs was that at least half of those who left were not in mandatory evac areas. Unfortunately you can't tell people that they can't leave if they want to. IMO, Houston area public officials did a great job of handling the evacuation and responding to problems as they arose.
Frank, the evacuation in Houston was staged for areas A, B, C and was announced over and over by the local media. Unfortunately there are in those three surge zones at least 500,000 people. The general public, even here in Houston which has experienced Hurricanes and tropical cyclones many times, is very, very uneducated as to the effects of a Hurricane and there in lies the problem. Also, people, unfortunately, panic when they hear there is a monster hurricane headed their way. Literally millions who were not in evac zones decided they had to leave too. If someone can come up with a way to make those that are not in mandatory evac zones stay home at least until the mandatory zones are cleared I'd love to see it happen so the evac plans can be worked correctly. As far as the nursing home bus is concerned, it was not in a mandatory evac zone. That evacuation was part of the homes policy as I understand it. Most of those on the bus were on oxygen or some other mechanical assistive devices so they needed to be in an area where electricity was available. I truly wish there was a way to keep those who aren't in mandatory evac zones from beginning evacs until those that are have been able to leave. But the question remains, especially in a country where we pride ourselves on free will, How do you tell people that they can not evacuate. It is indeed a tough problem.
That picture is worth a thousand words. Cameron appears to be, if it isn't Ground Zero, it's pretty close to it.
Rooftop rescue after rooftop rescue took place... sheesh
