Emergency officials credit Gustav evacuation - Yahoo! News: "Federal emergency management officials expressed cautious optimism Monday that preparation efforts for Hurricane Gustav helped avert the casualties seen in Hurricane Katrina three years ago.
Officials credited a successful evacuation and shelter system in citing a different outcome from Katrina's 1,600 casualties, but acknowledged that full damage assessments were yet to be made."
This is exactly the attitude that comes back to haunt us when we do actually suffer catastrophe. This was not Katrina. The levees held. I may even agree with an estimation that had the storm been dangerous - many lives would have not been lost in New Orleans and along the Gulf Coast (although they may have been lost elsewhere...) - because so many evacuated...
But to suggest that the death toll from Gustav was so much lower than Katrina because of effective planning and evacuations is to essentially (once again) and underhandedly blame the victims of Hurricane Katrina for what befell them.
And at the risk of further beating a dead horse -- I'd like to point out that we still don't have the official evacuation death toll... Oh! Wait... We never will.
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