By: Emilian Papadopoulos
It’s been nearly two years since Hurricane Katrina battered New Orleans and other southeastern areas. Hurricane Dean is approaching the coast of Mexico and is predicted to sweep into Texas. If Dean doesn’t turn into “the next big one,” some other hurricane will. When that happens, how much will response agencies have learned from Katrina?
In anticipation of Dean’s possible assault on Texas and neighboring states, here are a few good pieces:
If you want to know why there was no comprehensive, bipartisan, federal commission investigating the failures of response to Hurricane Katrina, start with this 2005 USA Today article.
The White House did produce a Lessons Learned document, which can be accessed through this fact sheet.
The Army Times has this good article on the Texas National Guard’s preparations. One issue it doesn’t address was at the heart of the failure in September 2005: collaboration and joint C3 between National Guard and federal resources.
NOAA’s site for tracking Hurricane Dean updates is here.
Of course, based on past performance, this may all be a bit too much for some players in the White House. There’s good news for them, too: Evan Almighty is still playing in theaters. … At least it’s a start.
Comments 2
For certain political issues I am content to ride out the remaining 17 months of Bush’s lame-duck presidency. For hurricane preparedness and response, though, it’s too much to hope that we’ll avoid the big one until this incompetent administration is out of office. There’s still a lot of hurricane season left this year, and he’ll still be president during next year’s season as well. And, despite the title of the White House report, I’m skeptical that the administration has actually learned any lessons from Katrina.
Posted 25 Aug 2025 at 1:28 pm ¶Just found a NYT article about post-hurricane insurance issues.. a good read: “Who Will Pay for the Next Hurricane,” http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/25/opinion/25hkunreuther.html?th&emc=th
Posted 30 Aug 2025 at 1:45 am ¶Post a Comment