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Sept. 25, 2005 Rita is showing that as far as evacuations go, the plans still need to be refined. The states must also make disaster preparedness a priority. Thousands of cars clogged the major arteries leaving Houston, Galveston, Beaumont and the Port Arthur areas. This caused gridlock lasting up to 14 hours. It also forced numerous drivers to abandon their cars after they ran out of gas. Perhaps if traffic hadn’t been so dense the bus explosion that killed twenty-four elderly people might not have occurred. Being that there was at least a three-day warning that a storm of such magnitude was probable for the area, why wasn’t the evacuation done incrementally? The cities could have been broken into eight or nine sectors with each sector being given a 6 to 8 hour window of opportunity to flee. In the future maybe such evacuations should be mandatory and enforced by the National Guard and/or local law officials This would cut down on some of the traffic problems that beset the evacuees. A similar set-up could be designed for the citizen’sr return. Once Rita hit FEMA workers and other emergency personnel were already in position. Already our government and other charitable organizations were able to apply the lessons learned during hurricane Katrina and its aftermath. I haven’t seen or even heard of much looting. But most important, this disaster will result in a lot fewer deaths. The residual effect from this is California voters are urging the state legislature to do all they can to raise the 90 million dollars to shore up the state’s labyrinth of levees. Governor Schwarzenegger is even urging the state’s residents to prepare for a disaster. Such a breach in the California levee system could cause an estimated 47 BILLION dollars and affect the drinking water of 22 million of the state’s residents. Various agencies around the state are advising that every household store enough food, water, medicine and other vital supplies to survive a minimum of three days. The California Office of Emergency Services offers a downloadable checklist for such emergencies at: http://www.oes.ca.gov/Operational/OESHome.nst/ or: http://www.preparenow.org http://claraweb.co.santa-clara.ca.us/fire/forms/disaster_prep_checklist.pdf#search='CA%20disaster%20preparedness%20checklist' ------------ About the author: Timothy Stelly is the 46-year old author of "Tempest In The Stone" and the soon to be released, "The Malice of Cain". His third novel, "Darker Than Blue" is under consideration for publication. Mr. Stelly currently resides in Pittsburg, California with his three youngest children Dante, Kimberly and Lawrence. Excerpts from The first two books and the first two chapters of his anthology, "Frankenigga--And Other Urban Tales" can be viewed at: stellbread0.tripod.com Email: stellbread@sbcglobal.com Tell a friend about this site! ------------ All articles are EXCLUSIVE to Useless-Knowledge.com and are not allowed to be posted on other websites. ARTICLE THIEVES WILL BE PROSECUTED! |
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