Terry Ebert says it all

Explosions rock New Orleans


"'This is a national disgrace,' said Terry Ebbert, the head of New Orleans' emergency operations.

'We can send massive amounts of aid to tsunami victims (in Asia), but we can't bail out the city of New Orleans.'"

It's true, it's worse than the tsunami and it's worse than a third world country. Now there are explosions. No one knows why except it may be a chemical factory. Everyone can be clever with hindsight, I know that, but they could have got everyone out. No one should be sitting in blood, urine and dead bodies. No one should be being raped and threatened. The people have been terrified by the storm and now they are terrified by survival. They have planes, coaches, helicopters. Countries are in there pledging funds of significant amounts. The water could have been dropped in. If it's dog eat dog, there's a reason for that. It needs to stop. People need to get in there, as they are now, to eliminate the fear, the filth, the degradation. Thousands of people living in one spot in the heat and with no food or water is bound to put on the pressure. While they were tracking the storm, they should have been amassing the relief packages and the exit plan. People are so desperate they are committing suicide and everyone is terrified and in such abject misery. Should have, should have, could have. Yes, we can be very good at that when we just don't get it into our heads how serious this can be. They need to get everyone out and comfortable and then the clean up plan will go so much more straight forwardly. The good will is there. But bullets won't solve this disaster. Restoring privacy, security and dignity will. I guess America could have stopped us from watching. We've seen it warts and all and it's easy being an armchair critic. Everyone is going to be so much more aware after this. Everyone is going to be so much more careful after this, and I would hope,every country will sit down and work out a master plan for mass evacuations and mass management in the event of such a disaster. We had a J learning curve here with cyclone Tracey, I wonder if we have looked at that management plan since and added to it and improved it. It won't be such a heart rending mess if the people in New Orleans can be rescued quickly now from this point onwards and we can all sit here and learn from their terrible ordeal so that we are better able to manage situations like this. Those poor people have done our field work. Let it not be in vane and may they be richly rewarded for their suffering which has been our "news".