You don't know his boss...

:vader1:

[B]PICTURES[/B]
 

Here are some aerial shots of the flood damage.

Slide two is an amazing shot.

Well, with the failure of the Ponchatrain canal levees, the worst case scenario has come to be. I heard this morning that they fully expect the flooding of the New Orleands basin to cease only when the water level reaches equilibrium with the level of the lake.

Even in the aerial shots I saw last night, slicks of gasoline, oil and chemicals are evident in almost every view as submerged gas tanks and vehicles lose their contents. As the water rises higher, more and more petroleum-based and other industrial contaminants will enter the festering mix, joining rotting bodies, animal carcasses and vegetable matter.

New Orleans may be a dead loss. As it is, the number of businesses unable to function and the number of people who have lost everything, jobs included, will be unprecedented in our history. Who is going to house and care for these people? Who will pay their outstanding credit card debt (now that they can't file bankruptcy to clear those accounts)?

You know the one thing I didn't see in all of the approximately 30 solid minutes of different videos and stills I looked at last night? A military presence that was more than the merest token.

Where's our military in all of this? Surely, this disaster calls for a strong military response, with all of their hardware, expertise and organization.

hey lj, check out slide #29.

and #25

Els:

4 navy amphibious ships are en route from Norfolk now. I agree with your point. Also, hasn't this historically been a job where the National Guard steps in first? Same problem, different symptom.

It is about time. It is going to take a lot of serious effort to clear out the rest of New Orleans.

If ever there was a good reason for a Federal Government, this is it.

The flood shots bigw00dy posted are awesome in the old sense of the word. And while I feel really badly for the NO residents, I couldn't help thinking with every slide, "It's gonna cost a fortune to repair this".

It wouldn't surprise me if one or more insurance company goes out of business over this. And with the current economy already limping and bleeding, I think that Katrina is going to cause a serious nosedive in our recovery.

Has anyone heard about the countries that are offering their assitance?

I don't think real insurance companies do much flood insurance, do they? Uncle Sam is gonna be on the hook for this one...

You misspelled 'taxpayers'. :(

I haven't heard anything this time around, but it is pointless for them to do so, anyways. Each time a country offers assistance to the US, it is turned away unless it is a very specialized team of people that perform a needed, critical function (collapsed building techs from Canada, etc) or specialized equipment the US does not have (remote controlled, people-seeking robots for finding people in rubble, etc).

And while it would be a nice gesture, offering financial aid to the wealthiest nation on the planet during a crisis it can clearly handle (or it thinks it can) is pointless.

With the New Orleans flood prevention and disaster preparation money, in Iraq.

sorry its spelled Griff...