So that was the teaser; the point is that the .gov hates it when you ignore their directions to bug out...Gustav holdouts' tales give evacuees pause
Their experiences could provide valuable lessons about evacuation versus staying put.
By Patrik Jonsson | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitorfrom the September 4, 2008 edition
New Orleans - After curfew on Wednesday night, two National Guard soldiers traded their rifles for a guitar and some drumsticks.
Taking the stage at a tiny lounge in the French Quarter, they plunged into a blues riff that, by the end, became a new song called the "Rockin' Army Blues."
Meanwhile, at a hurricane party in the Uptown neighborhood on the eve of hurricane Gustav's landfall, locals gathered on the front stoop to compare firearms as one young woman cradled a shotgun like she was holding a baby.
The night after Gustav came ashore, small squads of storm holdouts and National Guardsmen played an elaborate game of curfew cat-and-mouse. But they finally gave up as everyone ended up at the Maple Leaf lounge for a late-night gab session.
The biggest problem may be that, despite Mayor Ray Nagin's warnings of "The Mother Of All Storms", Gustav was fairly mild; many emergency planners are worried that those inclined to disregard warnings anyway will point to Gustav an how relatively easily the "Bug Inners" rode it out, and find themselves in a Katrina, or worse.While Katrina created thousands of both tragic and heroic stories that have been spun into countless yarns, articles, masters' theses, and books, Gustav's more mundane story lines are now becoming clear: Holdouts hunkered down, emerging to calmly walk their dogs and sweep up after the storm. Evacuees endured 12-hour car rides, shelters without enough cots, and then began running out of supplies and money as law enforcement kept them from returning.
To be sure, the decision on whether or not to evacuate again depends on more than perceptions and observations of hardship. In fact, researchers say, the two camps – the stayers and the leavers – tend to stick to their methods. Since Katrina, both federal and state officials have tried to wear down the resolve of those who historically stay, tapping into the gruesome memories from Katrina to drive home the message. This time, it appeared to have worked as the Gustav evacuation became the largest in US history, with over 2 million people leaving the Gulf Coast starting three days before the storm hit.
The article also talks about the tendency of the political appointees who ran FEMA post-9/11 and pre-Katrina to discount the need to "de-brief" those who had experienced the disaster/emergency themselves, for "Lessons Learned", and how, post-Katrina, this was fixed.
Of course, some of us live in areas that don't lend themselves to evacuating before a disaster--at least until "they" learn how to predict earthquakes, for example--so the issue is more "How bad do things have to get after the event before I pack up and go?" And "Where do I go?"
And the answer to those questions is properly "It all depends." How bad are things, how well have I prepared and how well have I come through, and how wide-spread is the damage? And all you can do is try to judge the hazards where you live, work, and play, plan and prepare for them as well as you can, and then wait...
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