New Orleans nightmare

Although it was well predicted, that hurricane is the greatest nature disaster ever in the history of the USA.... do you know anyone who lived there?

The news here are quite confusing as to what exactly is going on there, if anyone has reliable news I would be grateful... and last point - you think the USA government could have dealt with that any better? after all, half million people have been moved before the disaster as far as I've heard here.

Anyways, I pray for those who are now there and hope all of them will be safe soon.... USA might be big and strong, but surely this blow is very painful - reminds us humans how fragile we still are!!

My knowledge only comes from cnn.com and the local news. The goverment NEEDED to do more before the hit and NEEDS to do more now.

It is easy to tell people to leave the city, but what if you can't leave. Any large city in the US has a large population of low income families that can't spend a week in a hotel or have family they can go visit. Those are the people who have been stuck there since it hit.

My thoughts are the worst hasn't come yet, once they drain the city you will see the devestation the hurricane caused in lost lives (thousands???) and buildings.

My company along with many others in the US are donating money and supplies (canned foods ect..) to them. Just hope it reaches them.

its very tragic , and i can only pray for all those people!
latest i heard on TV was, that government has ordered Army to shoot at sight at people causing lawlessness.

but i feel really sorry for people who have lost their relatives and houses

that's nice to hear that many private companies are donating money... hopefully it's enough - after all it's going to take lots of billions of dollars to clean the mess and rebuild the city. yet again, it prove that people unite when in trouble.
I've heard that Israel is going to send Rescue Team next week - little but nice gesture in my opinion... this team has gained lots of experience during previous nature disasters, hopefully they can find and save lots of survivors.

The place has turned into the wild west, people have been looting stores, stealing guns from gun stores, shooting at rescue helicopters, etc...

Bush is sending an additional 300,000 army reservists to try and calm down the situation.

Military has standing command to shoot any looters.

it's greatly appreciated to hear those from other countries openly "care" about us...we don't get that too often...and it's wholeheartedly special to know that!

i am at the location(literally) where one of the many waves of Katrina victims have been placed...San Antonio Texas. We expect to place roughly 12,000 here on base and the rest in a nearby "city" facility....for a total of 25,000+ ...so far we have 3 semi trucks filled with canned goods to help...and more is expected. the victims as you can imagine...look tired and confused from the disorder..."could have the U.S. government dealt with it better?" - no. Although it would have been possible to evacute the people you have to consider some very enlightening facts...this area is one of the poorer cities in the U.S. and a huge percentage literally HAD to stay put because of no money and/or had no place to go..and even w/ hurricane tracking systems...it's still not an exact science....new orleans alone got 5 warnings of potential hits this year.....and none until now have hit it...so i guess it comes down to basically three questions - 1. How many times can a storm stop crying wolf as it storms towards U.S soil before it actually does hit??? Answer: Not until hurricane tracking is 100% accurate 2. Is it feasible to evacuate an entire city EVERYTIME it gets close...when it can turn in an instant as it had 5 times prior? - doubtful and finally 3.)what can you do with over 1.5 million people within a 2-4 time span? unfortuantely, i have to sadly say - not much


-Peace

It's nice to hear of other country's kind gestures toward the United States. I was beginning to think we were becoming much hated among other countries. As for New Orleans...my heart goes out to the victims and their families. I've heard from the news that 80% of the city is under water and saw on TV troops going through the city trying to reestablish order. It seems that the government has done a good job handling this, and I'm thankful for that. It could have been much worse.

I was visiting the red cross website to leave some money. I was very disturbed when I read this:

http://www.redcross.org/faq/0,1096,0_682_4524,00.html

probably that's the only way to put order back - huge forces of army. only after the dust settles down (the water, in this case) we will know the real dimensions of the disaster. last I heard, they were talking about over 10,000.


well, USA and Israel have always been tied together ever since Israel has been declared - but in this case it's more than that - it's pure bond between human beings! we really share your pain, and will do anything to help.


well, among the "western" countries USA is honored and admired, seen as the "Leader of the Free World" - things are different when it comes to Arab countries, which only see your actions as meddling and trying to spread moral corruption around the world. we won't get into that here!
could have been much worse? I'm really not sure...


so that means the army itself prevent help from the people trapped in there?? makes no sense!

any way that you look, you can't avoid seeing something very disturbing: those who has money escaped in time. they're all, or at least very major part of them, safe by now and just waiting until things will calm down. on the other hand, those who have no money are now either dead or dying in the flooded city. the disaster served as cruel and harsh social filter, and I wonder what would have happened if rich white people were trapped there now, rather than those are really trapped there.

I live in California but still feel the pain these people are going through. Our state alone has gone through a number of natural disasters in the past few years, but nothing compared to this of course. What really bothers me is the speed at which our Federal government took to start taking action. All I saw on the news this week was two things and two things only (with the exception of Friday): 1) the images and havoc in the affected cities/states and 2) a bunch of people holding press conferences to talk about what they were going to do. I was thinking "okay, it's great that we recognize what's happening; how about a little action?" I just hope now that the people who really need quick medical attention will make it and not pass away because this whole relief effort was so badly organized.