Evacuation Solution #1...Gas

[inotherwords]

The idea of more lead time and earlier evacuations is a good one, but don't forget, mother nature doesn't always give us as much notice as there was for Rita/Katrina.

Gas is a huge problem. Last year in FL we had shortages after so many storms in a row hit so closely together, and the tankers weren't delivering gas either by road or water because of the dangers of additional hurricanes on the horizon. Last year also, not as many people evacuated here that would now after they've seen what happened after Katrina.

Just imagine what would happen now, in the midst of an existing gas crisis, if large sections of FL had to evacuate for a large storm. It would be a real disaster.

As far as judging whether Houston's evacuation was successful, I don't think we can say this because they didn't get a hit from a 4 or a 5, which would have been the true test. I think Galveston's evacuation was efficient and would likely have been a success in a big storm. But Houston's? No way. Many people who wanted to get out but couldn't would have died.

[sponger]

Great post Mike! Gas is the one untouched issue on evacuations. Any time you have a major bearing down on a dense population, this is going to be a problem. Floyd taught me to always have enough cans to refill the tank at least once.

If this issue is not addressed, it will cause huge problems in the future. Early evac is not an option as most employers wait until the last moment to let you make a run for it.

I agree that for Cat 3 ob, prepostioned gas is the only way to go. It goes right in line with contra flow and other procedures. Next time there might be 20K people who did not evacuate due to scenes on TV.

[artist]

seems to me if there are ordered mandatory evacuations that employers should be required to close - unless they are essential personnel as deemed by a law. That would stop those that have to wait until the last minute. This would ease many evacuations I believe.

[isobar]

Gas is certainly a huge problem that Emergency Mgrs need to address. A number of people (my cousin in Houston included) gave up evacuating, turned around and went back home after spending hours in traffic with no way to refuel.

Not a good situation when your best option is to head back into the hurricane's path.

[Raider Power]

People must be encouraged not to fill multiple 5 and 10 gallon cans of gasoline as they head out of town. Get enough people doing that and what would be adequate supply at a station becomes a shortage. As I was leaving town, I saw many instances of this occurring, plus it was reported that in some cases, cans were being filled then sold to persons well back in the line.

I would also suggest that people simply have to travel lighter in an evacuation. Clothes, food, other basic necessities must be the order of the day. While evacuated, I worked at a shelter in East Texas and had a lady tell me her family evacuated not only themselves, but their boat and two jetskis. Her reasoning was that all were paid for and they did not want to lose them. End result is that they used more gas hauling the extra weight out of town, plus took up extra space on an extremely crowded highway out of town.

As best as can be done, people must use as few vehicles as possible to get out of town. I don't expect that people should overload vehicles with people, as that could potentially create difficulties as well, but expecting that each available seat in a vehicle be filled does not seem out of the question to me. I am guilty in this evac of being the only person in one vehicle while the rest of the family moved out in another. Had we worked out timing out better, we could have all gone out together comfortably.

I'll add this as well. People have long complained that H-town has too much freeway, but I would suggest the amount of freeway we have down here kept a terrible situation from becoming much, much worse. I think that when the construction on I10 is complete, that corridor will be easier to navigate to get out of town.

[vbhoutex]

Fortunately the governor announced this morning that planning to implement contraflow earlier and in proper places will begin immediately. Hopefully this will alleviate much of the problem if we ever have this type of evacuation again. That portion of the evac plan for this area apparently had not been worked out or planned. I did not see the news conference but just heard about it. Of course that type of evacuation procedure could/should be used if we have terrorist attacks at our chemical facilities and oil facilities also since most of them are nearer the coast or at least on the East side of Houston along the ship channel. It may be a day late and a dollar short, but at least they aren't wasting any time now.

[jax]

Gas has turned out to be a huge problem for residents evacuating from both Rita and Katrina. Many of the cars stranded on the interstates were stranded due to lack of gas. Time and time again, stations ran out of gas leaving costal residents with no options.

Worse, many of the gas stations were likely evacuated as well...

To me, this is one of the single biggest problems facing evacuation traffic in densely populated cities. Howe do you get gas in the cars so people can get away?

Solution #1 seems to be the deployment of emergency tankers at GAS stations before the evacuations begin. Rather than try to send an ill-equipped truck up the interstate to fill up cars...get gas preposotioned along evac routes. If station managers are unwilling to stay open...you have another issue...and perhaps a governmental emergency order could be somehow conjured up to allow the national guard to staff these stations.

In any event...and I have no formal trainig on the logistics of getting gas to gas stations...I would think we could come up with a way to get this fuel in position ahead of time so residents don't race around wasting valuable time looking for a gas station that still has gas.

MW[/i]

i would bet thet 99% of the cars that ran out of gas started the evacuation with less than a 1/4 tank... they didn't take the opportunity
to fill up in the days precceding.

[Raider Power]

I would say however that the evac plan for a hurricane and a terrorist strike are completely different animals. I have heard people on the radio say that this situation proves we are not ready to move people in the event of a terrorist strike. I contend that in the event of a chemical attack or even a dirty bomb attack that the course of action may not be evacuation, but rather, shelter in place. Getting hundreds of thousands of people on the road after a strike may be the perfect recipe for inflicting further harm in the minds of terrorists.

[Cookiely]

Mike, I agree with you. There needs to be a plan in which gas can be made available to those who are evacuating. A tank of gas will only last so long when one is stuck in bumper to bumper traffic for hours on end.

But if people left in stages, it should be enough to get you 200-300 miles, assuming there would be less traffic.

Sorry to hear about your uncle. Yes, the gas/power problems afterwards are another whole issue.

Leaving in stages would work theoretically, but what about those who don't follow the orders.
Didn't Houston (or maybe it was Galveston) order evacuations in stages? Or am I mistaken?

Yeah, that was my caveat in the previous post I made, would require alot of cooperation from the public, and probably more lead time.

Not just the public but employers. I've heard many times on this board where employers wanted the workers to come to work even though there were warnings for the area.

[Raider Power]

The timing of when to turn all freeway lanes outbound is extremely tricky. Do it too early and people who work in one part of town may not be able to get home easily to prepare for their own evacuation, plus certain critical personnel in city government or for infrastructure important industries may find getting to work extremely difficult, potentially making the outbound exodus more difficult.

[skufful]

I happen to own a gas station. During any tropical scare, I keep my tanks at the station topped off. I hold an inventory of of 24,000 unleaded and 8,000 diesel. I normally get a load every couple of days. My employees are asked to have their evacuation plans made far ahead as it is important for us to stay open as late as possible. In our three evacuations in the recent years it has been my experience that by the time any winds arrive, the roads are clear and my employees are able to evacuate. That is assuming the general public heeds the request to leave in a timely manner. We were lucky, and all of our storms veered north at the last minute, but my store also never closed, nor ran out of gas due.

My advice to the folks that live on the coast, when a system threatens, keep your tanks full. Most of those that ran out of gas would not have, if they had done so. Your car will run for hours and hours at idle when in traffic.

[maltauss]

i was thinking that the people that had horses could just ride out of town. one day it might come to getting back to basics.

[Stormtrack]

Since when was the evacuation of Houston a "miserable failure"? It was the largest evacuation to ever take place (well over 2 million people) and every single person was successfully out of the range of the storm many hours before climate conditions began to deteriorate, and far from the would-be affected areas, if Rita had followed the projected path.

It definitely was NOT a success. Alot of people are saying they won't evacuate the next time because they believe evacuating under a flawed system is more dangerous than staying. The truth is people in the state emergency management did not take their jobs seriously and just came up with a crude strategy without really putting any thought or effort into it. I have already emailed them with my displeasure. It should have been obvious that you don't merge people going to different destinations onto the same roadways. People were so disgusted that hardly anyone payed any attention to their return stategy. I doubt if anyone will follow their evacuation routes and times the next time.

[inotherwords]

I would say however that the evac plan for a hurricane and a terrorist strike are completely different animals. I have heard people on the radio say that this situation proves we are not ready to move people in the event of a terrorist strike. I contend that in the event of a chemical attack or even a dirty bomb attack that the course of action may not be evacuation, but rather, shelter in place. Getting hundreds of thousands of people on the road after a strike may be the perfect recipe for inflicting further harm in the minds of terrorists.

Not only that, but in case of nuclear or chemical disaster or terrorism, these people would be panicking. At least in Rita they knew the size, scope, and distance of their adversary.

Houston had a chemical disaster years ago on I-59. I believe it was a chlorine tanker and it killed some people who were stuck in traffic. It happened, I believe, in the late 60s or early 1970s but someone please correct me if I'm wrong. I moved there in 1978 and it had happened a few years prior to that.

[jabman98]

We chose not to evacuate, due to the massive traffic jams we were seeing on TV. We live near downtown Houston, and were very near flooding in Allison, so we were somewhat concerned about our situation this time.

Our neighbors tried to evacuate, but spent eight hours and went only twenty miles. They have a young son and finally returned home exhausted

Some good friends were in a flood prone area and were told to evacuate. After eight hours and only twenty-five miles progress, they finally gave up. They have an infant who recently underwent heart surgery, plus a two-year old. Their infant couldn't stay in the car any longer, so they made the decision to return home.

Given what finally happened with Rita, we are glad we didn't evac, but it did seem somwhat poorly managed - although moving that many people at one time is bound to be slow going.

Implementing contra-flow earlier would be helpful. Emphasizing that people should stay put/shelter-in-place if they are not in evac areas would also be good. I watched/listened to local coverage most Wednesday evening/Thursday, and did not see a lot of emphasis on staying where you were if you were not in a mandatory evac area.

I got the impression many people panicked because of Hurricane Katrina, and left, even though they didn't need to. This panicking clogged up the roads more than expected, it seemed to me.

[sprinklerman]

I disagree with the contention that the evacuation of the New Orleans area was a failure. Except for the city of New Orleans proper, everybody who wanted to and who could, got out. And New Orleans also could have evacuated in time if the city had properly executed the plan and had done it in a timely fashion. There still needs to be some changes done but I think they are minor.

[Eye10TX]

Houston had a chemical disaster years ago on I-59. I believe it was a chlorine tanker and it killed some people who were stuck in traffic. It happened, I believe, in the late 60s or early 1970s but someone please correct me if I'm wrong. I moved there in 1978 and it had happened a few years prior to that.

It was ammonia. I lived/worked a mile north and several miles west of the accident scene and had to shelter-in-place for hours afterwards--lots of people closer to it had to evacuate.

Here's a story about it:

~~~~~~
About 11:08 a.m., on May 11, 1976, a Transport Company of Texas tractor-semitrailer (tank) transporting 7,509 gallons of anhydrous ammonia struck and penetrated a bridge rail on a ramp connecting I-610 with the Southwest Freeway (U.S. 59) in Houston, Texas. The tractor and trailer left the ramp, struck a support column of an overpass, and fell onto the Southwest Freeway, approximately 15 feet below. The anhydrous ammonia was released from the damaged tank semitrailer.

Six persons died as a result of the accident, 78 persons were hospitalized, and approximately 100 other persons were treated for injuries.

The National Transportation Safety Board determines that the probable cause of this accident was the excessive speed of the vehicle combined with the lateral surge of liquid in the partially loaded tank truck, which caused it to overturn. The cause of 5 of the 6 fatalities and all of the 178 injuries was the inhalation of anhydrous ammonia. Contributing to the severity of the accident was the failure of the bridge rail to contain or redirect the vehicle.
~~~~~~~~~

[Radar]

The gasoline is a must when evacuation is the key to public safety. However, it is a problem when shortages occur. I think that the contra-flow in New Orleans actually worked well to help evacuate their city during Katrina. However, many New Orlean's people went East thus gridlocking I-10 across Mississippi, making it hard for MS residents to get out when our mandatory evac orders were called much later then in New Orleans. Fortunately for us Mississippian's we do have alot of back roads and I know of some people who used the "backroads" and were able to evacuate the area in a timely manner. In order to make this system run smoothly we must educate the public the best we can. When a storm is baring down on New Orleans, New Orleans residents should be encourage to do North or West (NOT EAST)... If New Orleans is in the cone then most likely so is the MS Gulf Coast and those resident should be encourage to go North or East (NOT WEST). It is actually common sense. However, I do know that alot of New Orleanian's were trying to go to Alabama and Florida where they had relatives and that is understandable, however, if they are just going to get a "room" they should try to go in the opposite direction of where the storm is going. Unfortunately many dont think about things like that and are just trying to get the hell out contributing to problems that evacuation already causes!