Lessons learned from Katrina
OK, I just finished reading a very long post on InstaPundit about leassons that should be learned from Katrina. Here is my favorite part.
5. Make critical infrastructure survivable: I think that one of the key failures was the collapse of the New Orleans Police Department’s radio system. Here’s the story on why:
Tusa said the police department’s citywide 800 MHz radio system functioned well during and immediately after the hurricane hit New Orleans, but since then natural gas service to the prime downtown transmitter site was disrupted and the generator was out. Transmitter sites for the police radio system “are also underwater with the rising water and [are] now disabled,” Tusa said.
Owners of the sites that housed police radio transmitters would not allow installation of liquefied petroleum gas tanks as a backup to piped gas, meaning generators did not have any fuel when the main lines were cut, Tusa said.
Radio repair technicians attempting to enter the city were turned away by the state police, even though they had letters from the city police authorizing their access, Tusa said.
This is absurd, and I’m pretty sure it’s the major factor leading to the disintegration of the New Orleans Police Department. That sort of gear should be survivable — and there should also be a backup plan for how to get messages back and forth if the radios go out anyway: Messengers, broadcasts on commercial radio, etc.
(There should be a separate post-disaster communications plan for survivors, too — so that they can locate relatives and let people know they’re alive).
Other crucial infrastructure should be hardened as much as possible, too. There’s only so much you should do, but disaster survivability should be considered at every stage of design, procurement, and construction.
I really hope that good things come from all of the destruction when it is all rebuilt. There has always been a New Orleans and their will always be. Unless critical changes are made, New Orleans will simply return to a place people love to visit but refuse to live. That I think is the real problem.