[extropy-chat] Getting AId to people in need

[The Avantguardian]

--- Dan Clemmensen <dgc at cox.net> wrote:


> 
> 
> By contrast, a hurricane-induced break in New
> Orleans' levees was 
> predictable, predicted, and evaluated as the most
> likely major disaster 
> in the US.

Yes but we all know that the people in charge do not
listen to learned experts but instead to a loud
booming voice in their head they call God.

> 
> Humans need a gallon of drinking water a day, plus
> some washing water. 
> Just how hard is it to commandeer all the water
> trucks in the towns 
> along the Lower Mississippi river, place hen in
> barges, and send the to 
> New Orleans? In my (rich) neighborhood, there are
> several companies that 
> have such trucks. Each truck has a 7000-gallon tank.
> the trucks are used 
> to fill swimming pools. 20 trucks a day will support
> 140,000 people. A 
> single tow-boat per day can trivially handle enough
> barges to carry the 
> food and water for 100,000 people.

Yes. Also what they ought to do is bring in powered
and solar stills. The problem is not there isn't any
water there, the problem is that it is contaminated.
Bringing them a gallon of water keeps one of them
hydrated for a day. Bring them a still and that person
can be hydrated indefinately.

> 
> What astounded me was the inattention the press gave
> to the levees. The 
> press did their hurricane thing, looking at the
> "standard" hurricane 
> damage in Biloxi and Gulfport,and they thought New
> Orleans was the same. 
> The canal levee was breached on Monday afternoon,and
> the press ignored 
> it until noon on Tuesday. The breach was the most
> important part of the 
> story, and anyone with the sense god gave a
> grasshopper should have 
> known it (with <10 minutes of research) at the time
> Katrina first turned 
> north in the gulf. I sure did. If I knew it, the
> governor of Louisiana 
> should have known it. When the Mayor (correctly and
> courageously) 
> ordered the evacuation and estimated that 100,000
> would be left behind, 
> the governor should have commandeered the water
> trucks and ordered them 
> filled.  Of course, someone should also have
> recommended that everyone 
> remaining in New Orleans fill their bathtubs with
> double layered 
> 30-gallon garbage bags full of water, and everyone
> should have placed 
> all dry food into double garbage bags, but that's
> too simple. I guess.

I am sure they ( the local government) did the best
they could. The notion that someone might be in need
of water after a flood may not come easy to many
people.


The Avantguardian 
is 
Stuart LaForge
alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu

"The surest sign of intelligent life in the universe is that they haven't attempted to contact us." 
-Bill Watterson

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