Katrina info thread II

[Koyaanisqatsi]

Since the last topped one was inexplicably closed after a random number of posts.

Info only, please.

There are fires in the railroad district, along with explosions. The police are trying to send hazmat teams because they don't know what's in the cars over there that might be burning, exploding, etc...

[Dis]

yep CNN (television) is reporting this right now if you are looking for a source of info on these explosions.

I prefer you guys post sources if possible.

[Koyaanisqatsi]

That was the source...but I know what you mean.

[Dis]

really scary. I wonder if it was intentionally set. It's like they want to destroy their own city. Their civic pride seems pretty crappy if you ask me.

[Tingkai]

Tales of woe shame a nation
Rosie DiManno
Toronto Star

NEW ORLEANS—Nature wrought destruction but human beings have brought disgrace.

It is disgraceful that countless people are still stranded five days after Hurricane Katrina slammed into the Gulf coastline, flattening communities and knocking a major metropolis on its ear.

It is disgraceful that hundreds of state troopers and National Guard soldiers have been deployed to protect property rather than help people.

It is disgraceful that thousands of hurricane refugees — including the elderly, the infirm, the sick, mothers with babes in arms, children separated from parents — have been essentially abandoned in the Superdome and the convention centre, left to fend for themselves without food or water.

It is disgraceful that not a single relief agency has any presence on the ground as far as those of us who are here can see. No Red Cross, no federal emergency administrators, no medical teams, no shelter officials, no angels of mercy.

That is why, beneath the damp and dank, New Orleans is seething.

That — and not rampant greed — is why there has been so much looting in recent days, to the extent that police and troops have been taken away from critical rescue operations and assigned to watch the inmates, or outcasts, who are being treated like vagrants.

And that's all they do: Watch. Patrolling up and down the main arteries, in their armoured personnel carriers — as if this were Baghdad — automatic weapons hoisted on their shoulders, never stopping to assist fragile citizens in wheelchairs and walkers or mothers with ailing, wailing infants.

I've seen better disaster response efforts for earthquake victims in India and the ethnically cleansed exiles of Kosovo. Even the prisoners being held at Guantanamo Bay are surely being cared for better than this.

Could it be because the overwhelming majority of these dispossessed are poor and black that their very lives are apparently of less worth than business properties in the French Quarter, deluxe hotels on Canal St., chi-chi mansions in the Garden District, and tourist casinos on the riverfront?

Rest of story at:

http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1125611421566&call_pageid=968332188492&col=968793972154&t=TS_Home

[Dis]

I don't care for the bias of that story. Looks like more of an opinion piece. to Toronto Star

This thread should post real news stories and not opinion pieces from newspapers in nations that have no idea what's really going on.

[Koyaanisqatsi]

Police are moving people off the roof of their building, where they've been all night trying to defend the place, because smoke from the rail fire is coming into the city and they think it might be toxic...

[Koyaanisqatsi]

They're playing an interview with the mayor of New Orleans on CNN right now...it's amazing. I don't know how to describe it. It needs to be repeated every couple of hours until this is over. He's pissed at the feds, and telling exactly why, and exactly what needs to be done.

Also explained something I've been trying to figure out...why people were attacking hospitals. They were looting drugs.

[Dis]

Originally posted by Koyaanisqatsi
They're playing an interview with the mayor of New Orleans on CNN right now...it's amazing. I don't know how to describe it. It needs to be repeated every couple of hours until this is over. He's pissed at the feds, and telling exactly why, and exactly what needs to be done.

Also explained something I've been trying to figure out...why people were attacking hospitals. They were looting drugs.

yeah I mentioned it in the other thread. He even called out the governor and her press conferences.

He said we authorized 8 billion for Iraq. I don't have the heart to tell him it was actually 80 biliion.

[Tingkai]

Originally posted by Dis
This thread should post real news stories and not opinion pieces from newspapers in nations that have no idea what's really going on.

The reporter is in New Orleans, not Toronto. You might not like what she is telling you, but she is telling you what is happening.

[Dis]

Originally posted by Tingkai


The reporter is in New Orleans, not Toronto. You might not like what she is telling you, but she is telling you what is happening.

I'm just not buying her excuse people are mad, that's why they are stealing. She says greed is not a motive. How does she know the motives? admittedly I don't know them either. I just don't like reporters speculating about these things.

[Koyaanisqatsi]

Oh yeah, not sure it had been mentioned--the Astrodome is now full, and they don't know what to do with all the people being bussed from the Superdome...

[Pekka]

I don't think cops are even interested in folks carrying food and bottles to drink from at this point. They might be worried about the ****ers who loot people's homes, weapon stores, electronic stores and basically everything that doesn't have anything to do with survival (well guns do). Those people, who think Christmas came early this year, are the scum of the earth. I don't care, poor or what ever. Scum of the earth. And those who are harming other people.. they are the worst. THose people will go to hell for what they are now doing, IF there is one that is, they just bought their tickets.

[Richelieu]

Originally posted by Dis
This thread should post real news stories and not opinion pieces from newspapers in nations that have no idea what's really going on.

To tell you the truth, the US looks like it doesn't know what's going on. The head of FEMA didn't know there were refugees in the Convention center as late as yesterday afternoon.

[Koyaanisqatsi]

He says that he learned about it yesterday morning when he saw it on the news. There's 15 or 20 thousand people there...how do you now know about that?