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Hang on, New Orleans. Here we go again.  I was still planning to spend a week of vacation down there this year doing rebuilding again, but depending on how bad it is, I might move that schedule up some. (Have pinged boss to ask about sudden vacation, but given that it's Labor Day, I'm not expecting to hear back too quickly.) My Red Cross certs are *just* about to expire (9/10, I was set to recertify CPR/First Aid/AED 9/12), but good enough, it'll hold. The evacuation seems to be proceeding in a much more orderly fashion this time; one hopes that we have learned something since last time. We could hardly do *worse*. (As I said to ![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) maramaye last night, hey, most of the elderly and ill who couldn't get themselves out already died last time we did this. You didn't see them on the news because they weren't out rioting, they were drowning alone in their houses. Still angry? Oh, you bet.) maramaye asked me what I thought would constitute "better enough". For me? No levee breaks... even though they rebuilt them for a Category 3. Gustav is currently a Cat 3, and gaining strength from the Gulf's warm waters. (My favorite is still the graffiti on the Lower Ninth's levee, which read HINDSIGHT in giant red and white letters. That brand spanking new levee? Cat 3. [facepalm]) Functional pumping stations. Orderly evacuation of everyone who can be talked into going, including the poor, the sick, and the elderly. Efficient use of resources to accomplish getting the people out -- no more fields of school buses washed away unused, no more disaster response units headquartered in low-lying areas and wiped out entirely. Efficient use of resources to get clean water and medical care in afterwards. No riots. No more blocking the bridges with guns to force refugees back into the city. (Fuck you, Gretna.) No more Superdome horror. Leadership from the Mayor, logistics coordination from the Governor, support and supplies from FEMA. No more heck of a jobs. (Fuck you too, FEMA.) No more attempts at bringing togetherness to my hometown: In the coastal town of Pascagoula in Mississippi, deckhands and wealthy vacationers used to live side by side. Then "Katrina" struck. Now the catastrophe has brought survivors together. Many are cut off from emergency services and must fend for themselves, if necessary at gun point.... Residents used to boast that Pascagoula was the "Pride of Mississippi," until now. The fate of this area, a coastal community razed to the ground by Hurricane Katrina, makes the scale of this catastrophe abundantly clear.For all the people who don't understand why we need New Orleans and don't just abandon it as a lost cause, consider this, excerpted from here: - The Port of New Orleans is 4th busiest in the world, and the busiest in the United States. Port of New Orleans handles about 145 million short tons (132 million tonnes) of cargo a year. It is a leading port for the movement of imported steel and is the nation’s top port for imported natural rubber. New Orleans is the nation’s premier coffee-handling port, with 14 warehouses, more than 5.5 million feet of storage space and six roasting facilities in a 20 mile radius. Two of the most modern bulk processing operations are located in New Orleans: Dupuy Storage and Forwarding Corp. (first in U.S.) and Silocaf of New Orleans, Inc. (world’s largest).
- New Orleans and Louisiana are of inestimable importance to the petroleum industry. Louisiana's natural resources include 11 percent of U.S. petroleum reserves and 19 percent of the country's reserves of natural gas. Louisiana has been the primary source of the nation's crude oil, second in production of the nation's natural gas, and second in total energy production. It has been the nation's second largest refiner of petroleum for consumer use as gasoline, plastic, and other petroleum-based products.
River freight traffic up and down the Mississippi supplies the heart of America with products, raw materials, petrochemicals, and energy, but you never see it until something breaks. Just ask the Coast Guard. "If we can't continue to move those barges, we shut down the entire transportation infrastructure of the United States. That's why the Marine Transportation System Recovery Unit is so critical."Even if you don't have the love for the city that I do, and don't think that it's an irreplaceable cultural treasure, it is in the interests of your standard of living to care. And given Louisiana's disappearing coast and the deleterious effects of MRGO and the continual erosion of the coastal buffers that steal the strength from hurricanes as they make landfall, it's in your interest to advocate for good engineering that will preserve our much-needed city. So, what next? Volunteer. (I have poked at several sources, but if y'all know of anyone that needs first responders, let me know.) For those of you that can't grab a go-bag and go, there are several good things you can do. bkdelong is running a transcription project, complete with manual. (Go BK!) If you ever wanted to IRC for a good cause, this is it. jessicamelusine has activism and charity links. (Go Jessica!) I can recommend Habitat of NoLA; I hope the houses I helped build stand. And finally, think about disaster preparedness and recovery yourself. Are you CPR and First Aid certified? It's only eight hours of your time, but you might save a life. Sometimes, you are that person in a position to make a difference. Thanks. Tags: katrina, new orleans, save the everything
Current Mood:  determined
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I am hideously behind on book reviews (there will be a monster post soon, no doubt), but this one was so fascinating that it gets a post all of its own. Bruce Myles's "Night Witches: The Amazing Story of Russia's Women Pilots in World War II" is one of the most fascinating historical novels I've read this year. He's done an excellent job of finding a little-known piece of military history and presenting a compelling story in a well-researched historical format. Most of the sources that he references had previously only been available in Russia, but Myles's efforts to interview the surviving pilots from the three fighter and bomber regiments really add historical detail and human interest to the story. To sum up, the German invasion of Russia in 1941's Operation Barbarossa nearly destroyed the Soviets' air power. Hitler targeted air fields and manufacturing facilities, leaving Russia both invaded and bereft of planes and pilots. As part of the response, Russia's famous female aviator (and Hero of the Soviet Union) Marina Raskova put out a call for volunteers for womens' air regiments. After sifting through the overwhelming response (apparently there were a sizable number of qualified female flight instructors and skilled pilots at the time -- even some high school girls learned to fly for fun), three regiments were formed -- the 586th Fighter Regiment, the 587th Bomber Regiment, and the 588th Night Bomber regiment, who came to be known as the Night Witches (courtesy the Germans that they harassed). The book shares the stories of the women who staffed these units as pilots, navigators, gunners, and mechanics. You see them drafted, recruited, inspected, flying combat missions. You see them get shot down behind enemy lines. Some survive concentration camps. Some die fighting. One marries her superior officer only after the war is over, another falls in love with her fellow fighter pilot and they defend each other in dogfights. You see them deal with sexism in the military and overcome it, the 588th Night Bombers eventually being elevated to Russia's elite units with the title of 46th Guards Regiment. You see skilled pilots having to accept roles as mechanics and support staff, since the military had fewer mechanics than pilots. You meet hot-dog fighter pilots like 5'0" Lily Litvak, who killed so many German planes that she became known as the White Rose of Stalingrad, and had her own call from German spotters. It took eight German planes working together to take her down in her much smaller, much slower plane. And finally, you read about these women returning to their old homes after the war, and the difficulty of seeing firsthand the devastation that they'd only previously seen from the air. Four and a half dogfights out of five; it's a really compelling read. Tags: book reviews, military history
Current Mood:  interested
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For the most part, here's my reading list from the road. I'm sure I've forgotten the ones I left in Seattle, but if I can't remember them they were probably just airport books anyway. ( The River's Tale: A Year on the Mekong )( The Braided Path trilogy: The Weavers of Saramyr, The Skein of Lament, The Ascendancy Veil )( Bangkok 8 )( Inheritance )( Song of Kali )( Numbers in the Dark and Other Stories )( My Name is Red )( China for Businesswomen: A Strategic Guide to Travel, Negotiating, and Cultural Differences )I also have to give a shout-out to the lovely people at Lonely Planet for writing such compact and useful phrasebooks. I lived off their Cantonese, Mandarin, Vietnamese, and Thai phrasebooks, and they were immensely useful in getting my meaning across. Never did master tonal speaking, but I could point and be understood. Current Mood: chipper
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( Gang Leader for a Day: A Rogue Sociologist Takes to the Streets )( Tactical Pistol Marksmanship: How to Improve Your Combat Shooting Skills )( White Night )( Yoshimasa and the Silver Pavilion: The Creation of the Soul of Japan )( Zen and the Brain )( The Steerswoman's Road )( The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-First Century )( How the Irish Invented Slang: The Secret Language of the Crossroads )Tags: book reviews, economics, fantasy, gaeilge, global economic theory, irish, japan, meditation, science, science fiction, second amendment, sociology, zen
Current Mood: cheerful
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Previous adventures 
