Mogadishu, Louisiana

It's eerie watching the images from a city just 70 odd miles down the road and reading about the looting. I want to hit the button and eject the DVD. I've played this video game and seen this post-apocalyptic vision many times before -- "Demolition Man," "Escape from New York," and even "Mad Max" but where the heroes drive flat-bottomed air boats.

But it's not a video game or a DVD. It's real and it's just down the road at a city called New Orleans. I remember how we looked at the scenes in Baghdad after liberation and gave the high-hat to all Iraqis for the actions of a few. That scene was a replay of the chaos in Somalia, and the raids on the aid convoys. We, the educated, the technologically-advanced, the Americans, are better than that and are immune and protected from disaster and the resulting chaos.

No, we're not. The unmuffled sounds of military helicopters flying overhead out of Ryan Airport in Baton Rouge prove that.

But those helicopters aren't arms of American imperialism -- they're there, like they are in Iraq, like they were there in Somalia, to save the helpless from the lawless. There's no excuse for the lawlessness and looting in this disaster's aftermath, as there was no reason for it in Iraq or Somalia or Haiti or any of the thousands of countries we've aided.

Already the call is out to blame President Bush for the hurricane. What can we expect from a segment of the populace when Madison Avenue has developed us into a generation that needs immediate gratification to survive?

I'm on the road a lot and the attitude doesn't surprise me. I had to make a delivery to New Orleans on Saturday and wasn't able to leave Baghdad on the Mississippi until late. The people were leaving in a steady stream and highway courtesy was rare -- people driving without their headlights on, failing to use directional signals, switching lanes every 10 seconds, tailgating, driving with their fog lights on when there was no fog.

If you drive like this and don't already know: This is discourteous. It's selfish behavior. How can I equate the discourteous traits of driving to looting? It's not a stretch; it goes to character. Both behaviors easily could lead to death.

The Democratic woman governor of Louisiana, Kathleen Babineaux Blanco, called for today to be a statewide "Day of Prayer," starting with a morning prayer service. Yesterday, local CBS affiliate WAFB-TV allowed Archbishop Alfred Hughes -- the displaced leader of the Roman Catholic diocese of New Orleans -- to sit at the anchor desk at primetime and lead the tv audience in a prayer. Moments earlier he had admitted the underwear he was wearing was borrowed because he had left New Orleans in a hurry, bringing no clothes with him.

Interestingly enough, I saw no media coverage of any bitching by lawyers for the ACLU, the Anti-Defamation League of B'nai Bri'ith or even the Council on American-Islamic Relations. It proves that God exists in foxholes. And proves we Louisianans feel like we're in a foxhole.

It's getting a bit uncomfortable in Baton Rouge as rumors of the chaos of New Orleans' disaster start leeching northward along with the flow of humanity. Almost overnight we've become the largest city in the state. The natural disaster that pushed the best of New Orleans to Baton Rouge also pushed out its worst.

We know that New Orleans not only evacuated its teachers and PTA mothers and small business owners but also (at this point, "some" of) the lower echelons as well -- the ne'er do wells of the Big Easy who may seem colorful adorning the French Quarter but who are definitely out of place in the more conservative community of Baton Rouge. We're not visiting the sinful city for a weekend of drinking and debauchery; the demons of hell have come to live with us ... and apparently it's going to be for a LONG time. It's like having the round-heeled tart you had fun with Saturday night knocking on the door of your house in the 'burbs Sunday morning.

Their crack dealers make our crack dealers look like small town yokels. I doubt if FEMA has heroin dealers and kilos of smack pre-positioned ready to rush to Baton Rouge. What happens when strung-out junkies needing a fix no longer have access to their regular dealer channels or money? I guess we'll find out. There already have been robberies in the area traced to the displaced. The local constabulary calls them "isolated incidents" but nonetheless has strategically placed shotgun carrying deputies in the vicinity of an evacuee center. I guess it's a damned if you do, damned if you don't situation. If you don't have security and something happens, there will be political hell to pay.

So Baton Rouge hasn't yet felt the criminal pain of suddenly being the state's largest city. But all those looted guns eventually will be evacuated from the Big Easy by their new owners, and Baton Rouge is the first major stop on the line.

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I wish I could write mystery fiction well. I've realized that a hurricane presents the perfect opportunity for evil intentions. A head wound from a baseball bat would look exactly like a head wound from flying debris. I'm sure that more than one of the bodies they find in the aftermath will have had their life snuffed this way. It seems like it would be the New Orleans' way. And with Lake Pontchartrain waters washing away any evidence that could be present, it would be the perfect crime.

Update 12/12/2005: Deja vu all over again.

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Living in Baton Rouge today, I suspect, must be a bit like living in Washington, D.C. in December 1941, and a bit like living in Rick's "Casablanca." All of a sudden we've become the central command in a war zone, not a war against an ideology but a war against the destruction visited upon this country by an uncontrollable force. And we've become the prime stopping off point for an influx of haggard, destitute, desperate refugees who have no idea when they'll be able to go home.

(I write "refugees" knowing full well that some people might have a problem with that term. But "evacuees" implies, to me at least, that the situation is temporary. It's a word incapable of connoting the immediacy and true need that a word like "refugee" does.)

The front is in New Orleans, but we're really the closest place with an decent airport and much of the infrastructure needed to support a command post and staging area. Planners at the Pentagon have always wondered if the U.S. today could fight a two-front war, if its citizens and the civil defense apparatus could handle an attack on our shores. Would we have the same mettle that forged Londoners during the Nazi bombing raids and the strength and stamina to rebuild once the enemy was subdued? The planners -- and the world -- are now getting their chance to find out.

War isn't just dropping bombs. As anyone watching the coverage of Afghanistan and Iraq must know by now, that's just the first stage, an attempt to get the upper hand in governmental decision making regarding the future of people's lives. Once the enemy's on the run, you've got to implement order and rebuild. The dead have no more problems on this earth. The struggles remain for the living.

My late mother used to tell me stories of shortages at the stores and the rationing during the depression and then, later, World War II. Sometimes all the stores had to sell were staples like beans or onions, which is how she acquired her lifelong taste for baked bean sandwiches and onion sandwiches. I complain now about the lines at the gas stations down here and the price of fuel. During the war years, for gasoline -- if cars were owned -- families were issued ration cards and would be allowed to buy a certain amount of fuel on a certain day of the week only. That fuel would have to last them all week. Even if they could have afforded fuel, much less a car, my grandmother didn't drive so I doubt if this was a problem for them.

And then there was a shortage of nylon, a relatively new invention useful for ladies stockings and parachutes. Because parachute material had priority, the nylons were in short supply. My mother, grandmother and Aunt Loretta would roll in laughter, tears streaming down their faces, reliving the story of the one pair of nylons they shared between them. Apparently, at one point or another, my mother -- a klutz in denial -- went tumbling down some steps while wearing the nylons. The first cries out of the mouths of my grandmother and my aunt were concern, not for my mother, but for that rare pair of nylon stockings. Priorities.

The shortages exist in the stores in Baton Rouge, though it affects far fewer items. Some of the shortages are caused because the maker of that item, like the bakery for the Thomas' NY Style Everything Bagels I love for bagel pizzas, is located in the storm ravaged New Orleans metro area and not currently producing food. And some of the shortages are caused by the mass influx of people in Baton Rouge.

The meat counter at my local Sam's Club was nearly empty Sunday (9/5/2005) when I went shopping. Admittedly I went shopping at closing time on the second day of the weekend. But the shortages of certain items were evident. Empty pallets holding nothing but cubic feet of air filled the aisles. The freezer section looked more like a cardboard box recycling area than an area to display product for sale.

Sam's Club is the warehouse store owned by the same company that owns Wal Mart. They love profit, the place is huge with lots of storage and the shelves hardly ever are empty. The store brand of dog food I buy - out. The Land o' Lakes brand Monterey Jack and Cheddar cheese for the bagel pizzas - out. The lower-priced frozen hamburger patties - out. Ground turkey - out. Breakfast sausage links - out. And, of course, no Thomas' bagels, just some offbrand from a bakery in Arkansas, plain, with no sesame seeds or onion. My entire grocery list was nearly wiped out.

This isn't what I would call a struggle for life. It's an inconvenience. I substituted and, unfortunately, won't lose a pound from hunger or brand deprivation. It's a far different time from when my mother was young, the country was at war and items were scarce. The onion sandwiches I eat today (sliced onion-the hotter the better, soft butter, salt, pepper, bread) I eat by choice, much to the chagrin of my friends and associates, not by a lack of alternatives. We're more efficient, not only at producing both guns and butter, but delivering them rapidly where and when they're needed. But our efficiency has given us a short temper. We expect it as a right.

Some people are angry and their blood is boiling because of the slow response of FEMA. I guess I am too. When anyone's life is at stake, any second delay is a second too long. We wanted and needed them yesterday. The death toll is expected to be high, in the thousands. But I keep reminding myself if a hurricane like this had hit in the 1940s, the death toll would have been in the 100s of thousands. So I'll pray for the dead and I'll pray for the survivors. And I'll thank God Katrina didn't occur 65 years ago. It's not much and it won't bring back the dead, but it's the solace that will keep me going, trying to be a better man.

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As if Baton Rouge and the State of Louisiana didn't already have enough to worry about, the district attorney for Orleans parish confided to a local tv reporter yesterday (9/20) that much of the evidence in new and on-going cases was destroyed in the flood. Additionally, he noted that witnesses have been evacuated to places far and wide. As witnesses and evidence are relatively important in proving cases beyond "reasonable doubt," he said citizens should expect that many arrested offenders may get off.

I can guarantee you that anyone in the Louisiana legal system -- or the federal legal system in the case of Louisiana's convicted notorious former governor Edwin Edwards -- is now scrambling to determine whether evidence already in custody was destroyed in the hurricane. If evidence is destroyed, how can a conviction be upheld on appeal? Ever see how they stack old cases in that tv series "Cold Case?" In cardboard boxes ...

The national media have yet to grasp the facets and the potential of this fiasco ... but it'll be fun when they do. Reports the local newspaper:

The hurricane has affected 5,934 civil and criminal cases pending in the Eastern District in New Orleans, according to information from court officials.

In addition to those numbers, an estimated 600-700 cases in the Lafayette-based U.S. Western District Court and 4,700-7,000 cases in the Baton Rouge-based U.S. Middle District Court involve New Orleans-area attorneys.

There are no firm numbers on how many displaced attorneys have made contact with the court or how many are grappling with such problems as lost witnesses, lost evidence and lost clients.

Whether the destruction of evidence will open the gates of Angola and local and federal prisons across the country remains to be seen, but if so, the nation would not have seen as many criminals placed upon the streets of middle America at once since the Mariel boatlift.

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I've been trying to decide whether to change the date of this blog entry, but every time I go to do it, I stop myself. The entries on my blog are not a daily diary of my activities but more of an open ended, ongoing commentary of how I view things. As I note on the blog's sidebar, "This news and commentary blog is constantly under construction and old posts may be updated with more timely information."

Additionally, for some reason or another, my circadian rhythms on this subject feel like a clock that stopped when the water level started rising in Chalmette. August 31, 2005. 1450 CDT. I'm shocked by what I see in America. This is a day I no longer remain an observer of events in the New Orleans metro area and in Baton Rouge but instead become a commentator on the changes I see, the news I see not yet reported and the issues yet to be addressed.

I'm not rich so I can't donate much to help the evacuees and refugees. By the time I get my clothes together and washed, the local tv stations are running commercials that the shelters have got all the clothing donations they need. I'm a trained EMT and pretty much from Day 1, when I hear the destruction is widespread and getting worse, I'm trying to volunteer my help, but EMTs aren't needed. I call around and offer my help, and receive an interrogatory in reply: "Are you a nurse, a doctor? We need nephrologists. Sorry. We'll put your name of the list."

Like Meatloaf sang, "I'm all revved up with no place to go."

This is a disaster unlike most disasters where EMTs might come in handy. In this disaster, we're 5th wheels. EMTs aren't allowed to start IVs on dehydrated victims, or do glucose tests and administer insulin to diabetics who have been days without their meds. Paramedics can do those things; EMTs can't. We're the first responders whose primary skills are ABC -- airway, breathing, circulation. Initial assessment. Open and maintain an airway. Heimlich if necessary. Make sure the patient is breathing, or kick start them with CPR and/or an AED. Take spinal precautions. Control life threatening bleeds. PUHA - Pick Up, Haul Ass. Vitals, splints, ongoing assessments on the way. "If they can't breathe, nothing else matters." Right, Miss B?

But ABCs aren't needed here. Electricity is needed. Clean water is needed. And above all, some mature, apolitical decisions by the incompetent mayor of New Orleans and the inexperienced governor of Louisiana are needed. We need a general, a goddamn warrior to make decisions to fight a war to save lives and what we've got are ward healers: a loudmouthed incompetent psycho and an inexperienced tourism-trained bureaucrat concerned about turfmanship. People are going to die. The obvious call for a Dunkirk-like flotilla of private watercraft to rescue survivors doesn't go out until day four.

On 8/30, I'm dumbfound like anyone else -- why isn't aid pouring into New Orleans? I put an e-mail out to an e-list of fellow alumni from the U.S. Naval Academy, wondering why the 'gator Navy, amphibious ships from Virginia, hasn't been dispatched to the Big Easy. Days later I find out the USS Battaan (LHD-5), an amphibious assault ship with a full hospital, helos, 1,800 open berths and the capability of making 100,000 gallons of fresh water daily rode out Katrina in the Gulf of Mexico and was waiting off the Louisiana shore to offer aid. But the aid wasn't given immediately because none of the infighting, incompetent politicians in Louisiana had asked for help!

I read about the frustration of other EMTs, paramedics, nurses and physicians wanting to help, having skills and supplies and being thwarted. I read a story about fire fighters stuck in an Atlanta airport, drinking beer and learning about sexual harassment from FEMA, frustrated they haven't been called to help yet in the way they think they're supposed to help. I try to explain in a Yahoo news story message board note what I've found out. I write to no one in particular:

I understand what these guys must feel, wanting to get into the fight so to speak. But there are way too many helping hands at this point for the work that can be done.

I live in Baton Rouge and I'm an EMT. I've been unsuccessfully trying to volunteer since day one. But this isn't like an explosion or an attack like you'd expect with a lot of trauma cases. It's a logistics problem primarily with people who need to be evacuated and sheltered in safe locations. And it's a civil law problem with looters taking advantage of a breakdown in order and preventing evacuation and repairs. And it's an engineering problem to get the water drained, the gas mains shut off, the sewer, telephone and water lines fixed and electrical fixed. It's a MASSIVE environmental problem that needs to be cleaned up safely. And it's going to take years and a lot of effort in the really, really, really crummy jobs.

They don't really need fire fighters or EMTs. They'll need demolition and construction crews, and people willing to shovel the remnants of a toxic soup. Most of all it's a MASSIVE economic nightmare because this all has to be paid for somehow and most of those businesses are out of business - forever - and most of those people are unemployed. And all that toxic, polluted water going back in the Lake Pontchartrain is going to wreck the oyster beds and poison the shrimp and destroy the Gulf Coast seafood industry for years. All those waterlogged cars are destroyed and will have to be removed. All that furniture and things that people have collected will have to be removed. Most of the structures will have to be knocked down. Do you know of a landfill large enough for all this crap? People don't yet realize how truly MASSIVE this problem is and how long the effects will be felt ... 20 years, 50 years? More?

By the end of the first week, I can't hold it in. I understand why I'm not needed but understanding is logic and I'm way-y-y-y-y past logic at this point about the issue. Those people may not need the kind of help I'm trained to offer in an emergency, but I have to help -- no ifs, ands or buts about it -- if only for my sanity. I'm like most everyone out there, in the U.S., in the world. Except I'm 70 miles away from the problem and not helping. I know this thing will be going on for years and there will be plenty of opportunity to help once the bloom is off the disaster rose, the cameras are gone and the jobs are really dirty and mundane. But it doesn't matter. I'm getting Post Traumatic Stress Disorder just watching the news from the local channels 24/7. I don't have cable and it's flip, flip, flip, flip. I'm trying to watch every station at the same time, read every article as it's posted on the internet. I've got to help, please let me help! Number one rule in a disaster for EMTs: Don't self-respond. But I'm ready to toss that rule right out the friggin' window. I'm ready to hit Wal-Mart, buy 10 cases of water bottles and PUHA.

Other EMTs from the Baton Rouge area I know call and write me. How can we help? I don't know, I tell them. I've called around and hit brick walls. I write a friend at the state bureau of EMS and ask, no, more like plead. We've got to help. What do you need? We'll do it. September 9, I finally get my chance. On September 10 I pen this note to my relatives and friends:

Got back late last night, was bushed and crashed so didn't pen any notes. I was the medic on a volunteer Search and Rescue team sent into Orleans east and St. Bernard to look for survivors or identify homes, through odor, that could contain victims. We came up empty handed on both counts. In one section not really afflicted by the levee flooding but which had flooded because of the storm surge the water had dropped about 3 feet in places judging from the water marks. But there was still water there, enough for the airboat I was riding in to traverse the neighborhoods. There were broken tree limbs and mud all over the place in this particular subdivision. It appeared to me that nature put up a good fight but, in the end, was unsuccessful reclaiming what man had changed. Snapping turtles and water moccasins played in the still flooded street instead of children. The odor was horrible, and we weren't even in the worst portion of the city.

There is serious destruction in New Orleans but many homes and businesses also were spared. Most of the utility poles along the main streets are down. You've seen the pictures. You know the score. Not even considering the repairs, the clean up will be very, very expensive and take a long time. The water level in Orleans east has dropped but it is still high in St. Bernard, in enclaves and subdivisions north and east of Six Flags, where the water reaches to the roofs of may of the single story dwellings. If people survived the flooding there, they've been in the attic for nine days, where temperatures will reach over 130 degrees and would not have survived the heat. It was marked as an area that needed physically to be checked for victims once the waters receded.

What we did see were many, many pets that were left in New Orleans, several which were quite emaciated but whose fear of the airboats was still greater than their hunger. The storm had knocked down backyard fences and given them their freedom. The driver of one of the other airboats managed to save a very friendly and quite hungry adult male pit bull and a pit bull puppy that had been locked in a house by their owners. The owners had left a window open. As the airboat driver went up the street he said he could hear the dog barking. I had brought some peanut butter and cheese crackers with me as rations for survivors, and the pups inhaled them. Even better, the adult male's name and the telephone number of his owner were engraved on a tag on his collar. The phone may not work now but he's been identified and eventually he and the puppy will be reunited with his owners. His name, btw, is Zeus, which is also the name of one of the Mardi Gras parades.

There is still disorganization -- a lot of hurry up and wait, who's going where, who's authorized what. We didn't leave Baton Rouge until 9:30 although the airboats had arrived by 6 a.m. and I had arrived by 4 a.m. The original mission, to help in the recovery of 58 bodies from Memorial Medical Center, was scrubbed because of fear the propwash from the airboat would disperse contaminants into the air. (Final count, 45 bodies from 317 bed facility.) When the second mission was assigned, we had to wait to ensure we had security available. No boats can proceed on any missions without armed guards. We arrived in New Orleans about 11 a.m. but didn't get out to start searching until 12:30 p.m. Our security was a team of four green beanies, a Green Beret "A" team from Fort Campbell, Ky.

But while there is disorganization, there is a definite feel to the air that folk down there have the strength to rebuild. With the arrival of the National Guard and the airborne, New Orleans has turned a corner. "New Paris" has been liberated with Louisiana's hometown hero, Lt. Gen. Russel Honore, in the role of DeGaulle. And the liberation has brought some scenes that you never thought you'd see, like twin Blackhawk helicopters landing on Chef Menteur Hwy. in tandem to pick up a team of door-to-door searchers and transport them to another neighborhood. Surreal! But then again, that's one of the things the French are known for ...

I contemplated posting this communique to the blog as well, but it contained information -- specifically the information about the bodies at Memorial Medical Center -- that was not yet public, so I refrained. Besides ... two airboats, six civilians, a Green Beret "A" Team ... and we managed to save two dogs and pass the word about the other pets in the area. But they were some really happy and friendly dogs, which in my experience is rare in a Louisiana pitbull. It was better than nothing.

I spoke with a friend a few days later who had volunteered and been assigned to that body recovery mission. He told me that mission was scrubbed and he, instead, was sent on another. The intel his group received claimed 30 survivors and 21 dead waited at Lindy Boggs Medical Center, one of the first hospitals to lose its generators. As with any war, the intel was bad -- incorrect and out of date. There were no survivors left, they'd already been rescued, but there were 19 cadavers for transport. A fire fighter and EMT for more than 20 years who has seen his share of accidents, he looked me straight in the eye and then straight past me for a five-mile stare and said it was the worst job he's ever had in his life and no amount of Vicks VapoRub would stop the stench of 9-day-old death from penetrating his nostrils. But someone will have closure because of it.

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For me, death took a holiday following Katrina. My dog Rocky, diagnosed less than a month ago with a fast growing cancer, had stopped eating in the days prior to the hurricane. When healthy, he'd inhale as many biscuits and dried pig ears as he could, but not even breakfast sausage links or hamburger would convince him to eat now. The tumor on his neck had grown to the size of a baseball and was rock hard, and the tumors in his kidneys wouldn't allow him to process water. He'd drink half a dish full of water and then, shortly thereafter, lift his leg and try for the Guinness Book of Records for dog urination duration. Were there such a category, he'd be the hands down winner.

He didn't appear to be in too much pain, but he was mopey and getting very weak in his hips. Pain seemed the next step and I was determined to keep my best friend from that discomfort. But Katrina had taken the power out at the vet's office I use. My calls to determine whether an appointment was required for them to help me kill my dog were answered by voice mail. But then Rocky started eating again. No biscuits, but he'd gnaw a bit on a dried pig ear. And when I was able to get over to Sam's Club early enough to score breakfast sausage links and hamburger patties before they were sold out, Rocky seemed interested but not interested enough to give himself a full belly by any means.

His second wind gave me a chance to enter the denial phase of the grief stages once again. "He'll get through it, it'll just look like he swallowed a miniature football," I lied to myself. "I've seen other dogs with large benign tumors, like that Shar-pei owned by the guy I bought a used refrigerator from back in '91." And it gave me enough comfort to convince me I could leave him alone with his sister so I could go on a trip to Orleans east and St. Bernard and try to help.

But the second wind in Rocky's life that followed the killing winds and water of Katrina was short-lived. Rocky once again stopped eating and got weaker by the day. And, in the last two days, he even stopped drinking water. He had lost 25 percent of his body weight in a month and it showed. I could have continued to let him starve to death, or suffer and die miserably from dehydration like Terry Schindler Schiavo. But I didn't. So, before Rita could take the power from the vet and me, on Sept. 23, I took my boy to the vet and tearfully said good-bye, or at least said good-bye as best I could. Goodbye Rocky Raccoon (how he got his name -- not a tough guy, he was a big marshmallow and he looked like a raccoon ...). Goodbye Panda Boy ( ... or a Panda). Goodbye Rockimus Houndamus (when Gladiator was popular in the theaters). Goodbye Rock-in-toshio (sort of like "Macintosh" but pronounced in three strong syllables with a Japanese accent a la "Shogun"). Goodbye my buddy, my boy, my friend. All good dogs go to heaven. Tell them you did your job and were loved deeply. When you see your mama, the family and St. Scott, tell them I said "Hey!"

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Has anyone else noticed how much political capital Texas Gov. Rick Perry has grown during the hurricane crisis on the gulf coast, from his assistance finding shelter for displaced New Orleanians to his mature leadership during the evacuation of Texas communities from Rita?

New Orleans mayor Ray Nagin and Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco had the same opportunity to step up to the plate, but they struck out and, to differing degrees, failed to take responsibility. But it appears that while everyone else was losing their heads, Pres. Bush and Gov. Rick Perry kept theirs.

Looks like the G.O.P. has another horse available for a future race.

It's not that Gov. Perry's administration didn't make mistakes, but he's readily admitted the problems he faces. Everyone makes mistakes; it's the leader who uses the education from those errors to advance.

I went searching through my personal archives and found this Associated Press article from last year:

Ivan Exposes Flaws in La. Disaster Plans
Sun Sep 19, (2004) 2:38 PM ET
By KEVIN McGILL, Associated Press Writer

NEW ORLEANS - Those who had the money to flee Hurricane Ivan ran into hours-long traffic jams. Those too poor to leave the city had to find their own shelter — a policy that was eventually reversed, but only a few hours before the deadly storm struck land.

New Orleans dodged the knockout punch many feared from the hurricane, but the storm exposed what some say are significant flaws in the Big Easy's civil disaster plans.

Much of New Orleans is below sea level, kept dry by a system of pumps and levees. As Ivan charged through the Gulf of Mexico, more than a million people were urged to flee. Forecasters warned that a direct hit on the city could send torrents of Mississippi River backwash over the city's levees, creating a 20-foot-deep cesspool of human and industrial waste.

Residents with cars took to the highways. Others wondered what to do.

"They say evacuate, but they don't say how I'm supposed to do that," Latonya Hill, 57, said at the time. "If I can't walk it or get there on the bus, I don't go. I don't got a car. My daughter don't either."

Advocates for the poor were indignant.

"If the government asks people to evacuate, the government has some responsibility to provide an option for those people who can't evacuate and are at the whim of Mother Nature," said Joe Cook of the New Orleans ACLU.

It's always been a problem, but the situation is worse now that the Red Cross has stopped providing shelters in New Orleans for hurricanes rated above Category 2. Stronger hurricanes are too dangerous, and Ivan was a much more powerful Category 4.

In this case, city officials first said they would provide no shelter, then agreed that the state-owned Louisiana Superdome would open to those with special medical needs. Only Wednesday afternoon, with Ivan just hours away, did the city open the 20-story-high domed stadium to the public.

Mayor Ray Nagin's spokeswoman, Tanzie Jones, insisted that there was no reluctance at City Hall to open the Superdome, but said the evacuation was the top priority.

"Our main focus is to get the people out of the city," she said.

Callers to talk radio complained about the late decision to open up the dome, but the mayor said he would do nothing different.

"We did the compassionate thing by opening the shelter," Nagin said. "We wanted to make sure we didn't have a repeat performance of what happened before. We didn't want to see people cooped up in the Superdome for days."

When another dangerous hurricane, Georges, appeared headed for the city in 1998, the Superdome was opened as a shelter and an estimated 14,000 people poured in. But there were problems, including theft and vandalism.

This time far fewer took refuge from the storm — an estimated 1,100 — at the Superdome and there was far greater security: 300 National Guardsmen.