allies and katrina

[skeeter@ccia.com]

As this Country rushes to help other countries in time of need with things like food, water, help rebuilding etc...does anyone know of or heard of other Countries offering help here and if so, what kind?......I have heard nothing in the media anywhere of such actions from abroad...









mugrump....has anyone ever seen one of these birds?

[Valigator]

Last thing I heard was over 90 countries offered some kind of aid....

[toxic111]

There has been an incredible outpouring of aid, even from countries that really don't have anything to give, but still gave cash.

I know that Canada has sent cash, people and 3 navy ships down (have to remember that is about all of our navy!)

[Jack]

Mexico currently has 300+ Marines ashore in Biloxi, helping with clean up and helping the survivors.

[Jack]

Try this link: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9363899/
About every country you can think of-and many you wouldn't, have sent aid.
Like Sri Lanka, Tunisia, etc. Places that don't have squat are sending us help. Along with most of the developed countries in the world.

[toxic111]

I will comment on one thing here, might not be the right thread, but here it goes.

I finally heard from a friend in MS, they live about 1.5 hrs north of NO. They basically just got power and phone back (they were lucky) They didn't have much damage. BUT they basiclly didn't get any help from anyone.. the National Guard was there for one day, and gave them a small bow of food, which contained a small bag of dried beams, and small box of dried pasta, and some rice. Not much for a family of 4. No water, or any other aid was given.

They are one of the lucky ones, they had minimal damage to thier house, and just lost trees. Other family members lost everything to the floods in NO and the suburbs.

Hopefully the aid will start getting to the outling areas, where it is needed.

[Rocky Raab]

Not picking a fight, but if they had little to no damage, just how much else SHOULD they have gotten? As much as somebody who lost everything? If it were me, and I had little damage, I would have said, "Keep that for somebody who's in real trouble. I'll make do."

But I'm not there and so maybe ought to keep my mouth shut. Didn't mean to offend.

Oh, by the way, I just heard that Kuwait is kicking in with a grundle of money and help. I'd be delighted if they sent a few tankers of free gasoline, too.

[toxic111]

Rocky, this is based on what my freind ranted about in an email to me..

Here is a copy:

On a side note, let me vent a bit. What you hear on the news about FEMA isn't true. It's a lot worse. FEMA is non-existent here in McNeill, thanks to the National Guard. They WERE here a few days after the hurricane with ice and water for residents ... and food. We received one of the standard boxes of food given out. It contained a bag of dried beans, a bag of dry rice, a bag of dry pasta, and a can of black beans. This was passed out to people who had no electricity and no water. After that one day, they disappeared. Down here, we're hearing that FEMA is only going to cities where there are motels rooms to house the officials. They won't even acknowledge that Slidell, a Louisiana city that fronts the Gulf of Mexico, has half of its city living in rubble. If you don't have tent cities for your refugees, then you're not in need of help.

Where I was getting at Rocky, is there are areas with minimal damage, but no power or water.. they need the help just about as bad as everyone else. At least for food and water. Also my friend didn't have much damage to thier place, but friends of thiers in the same town lost everything, and this is not on the coast at all.

Oh, and Rocky, I would expect, even with minimal damage, that there would be help for food and water. Especially the water.

[Rocky Raab]

I can see that.

I can understand the other viewpoint, too. The Guard may have come through, taken a look and helped out who they found, but then went on the areas with much worse damage and destruction.

Now, the point about FEMA...well, there may be two sides to that, too. If you were detailed to an area like that, you have to have some place to stay. Do you take up already precious space at a shelter? One can't expect them to sleep in ditches.

On the other hand, I've worked with FEMA types, and some of them were primadonnas, arrogant and spoiled bureacrats. So not much would surprise me.

[toxic111]

I guess all we can go by is what we see on the news, or the few first hand accounts I have heard.

The one above is from someone I know well.. and she is one that does not rant often, and when she does, she will really vent.

[fabsroman]

Okay folks, lets realize that this is a disaster, and a huge one.

Now, I can also say that a ton of Americans are unprepared for anything, me included in the food category. However, I have plenty of guns, ammo, and bottled water. The food situation will be remedied as soon as I complete my garage.

I used to make fun of my parents for having cases of canned beans and cases of pasta in the basement taking up space, but now I see that a person needs to go through a war such as World War II or a natural disaster like Katrina to appreciate things and be prepared for these types of things. If anything ever happened here, everybody in my family would head to my parents place.

As far as your friend ranting about not having food or water, does she have a car? If she has a vehicle at her disposal, she should have the ability to drive somewhere, even if it is several hours away, and get food and water and haul it back. In fact, with one such drive, even if it is 10 hours each way, she should be able to load up the car or truck with enough food to last a month if she can afford to buy the food and she can afford the gas. Last I checked, I could probably drive 7 hours on a tank of gas, so two tanks of gas should be able to get her somewhere to the north where food is available.

Now, if she doesn't have a car, gasoline, or the funds to afford to drive that far and buy that much food, then she is in deep trouble.

That brings me to another issue. Most Americans live pay check to pay check and from what I have heard, the average American has $16,000 in credit card debt. Again, poor preparation for tough times.

While the government is to blame for some of this stuff, there is only so much the government can do. Should we any of us survive a nuclear war, would we expect the government to be at our aid the next day? This hurricane is almost the equivalent of several nukes property damage wise. Thank God it wasn't as deadly on a life scale. Americans in general are just not prepared for bad things to happen.

My entire life, my parents have always been saying that if war ever occured on American soil, Americans would have a tough time dealing with it because we are soft. Now, I am starting to believe them.

With that said, I'll have my garage stocked with several months worth of canned and dry goods just in case something happens.

[toxic111]

Fabs, from what I gathered from her email (the parts that I didn't post, as they didn't pertain to this discussion, is that they were not able to get out of the town they were in. What I did hear, from her, and some news accounts was that most streets out of her town were blocked by trees. Now this is from out of the town, they were getting stuff cleared out when they could.

I'm been thinking about what I have here, and how long I could survive in a disaster situation. For me, it would be a blizzard or ice storm taking out power. If a blizzard, I can melt snow for water, we have a wood fireplace, so heat is covered. But I would need more wood for an extended stay.

Now back to my freind, I am sure that they did have a stock of food and water. But they had no idea how long they would be without power or the means to get out of the area for supplies. I know I would want to get what I can from the NG or whoever was in the area to help, just to make sure I had that extra couple days as needed.

Since I have been following the new reports of the disaster in MS and LA, I know the damage extended for hours in each direction. I would expect that she would have to drive over 4 hrs to get supplies, if they could be found, or if she could get out, and even find gas.

The location she was in was about 1 hr or so north of NO right in the direct path of the eye. So you can imagine the damage that was done to the area.

Maybe this disaster will make us all think, and to make sure we can live for 2 weeks with canned goods and water.

[McPat]

For those of us who didn't have the foresight to stock up on canned and dryed food stuffs, not to mention water, How much should one have on hand for say a family of four?
McPat

[Valigator]

You wanna see America crumble to its knees? Take away its power. So many things are dependant on it and Katrina showed us all what will happen when the gas stops flowing....

We either find alternative sources for energy or we take what this dependency is going to heap on us...personally I would love to see OPEC and their families Rolls Royces repossessed and those towel heads back on camels and in tents...

We have a patient who is a Saudi princess...there are quite a few of those by the way...she is the most self centered, spoiled, nasty, excuse for a human being I have ever had the displeasure of meeting...I would take her out for the sheer pleasure of it...

I have said it before...when it comes down to a natural or man-made disaster, you got nobody, but you ...your families and your neighbors need to make a plan....and plan it to a worse case scenario...that way ...you can pull together and spread out the details...

[fabsroman]

Toxic,

I take it you didn't take my post the wrong way. Obviously, if she doesn't have a way to get out of the city, then I think she is correct in complaining about the government's lack of help.

However, like Val said, we should all be prepared for the worst. At this Sunday's family dinner, I am going to mention that should anything big happen around here, we are all to meet at my parent's place. I live the furthest from them, but have the best chance of making it there because I have the best truck out of all of us. Now, one of my sisters is on the way, so I think I might tell her to stay at her place and wait for me to pick her up. The other sister is living with my brothers right now and they are 2 minutes from my parents.

McPat,

Regarding a family of 4, think about what the water consumption for a single person should be for a day, multiply it by 4 and then by 14. That is the amount of water you will need. As far as food goes, I think pasta, rice, and beans will cut it for several weeks. You might want to have other things on hand, but I don't know what they are off the top of my head because I have never had to plan for this stuff.

Does anybody know what a person needs nutritionally to survive for 2 weeks?

[toxic111]

Fabs, I take every post that anyone leaves with a grain of salt. In other words, I try to take it the way the person was writing it. I never try to get in a flame war, or write when I am angry at a poster.

Now I think an average person can get by on 1200 calories a day, more if you are active. If you are active you will need protien.

I think if a major distaster took place, I might be hunting a little to get that, and take what may come after the fact.

I know because of what has happened down there I will take greater stock in what I should have here, and try to keep it stocked.

[Jonesy]

I guess I don't understand the clean water thing. Does any one know how to boil water? It might not taste the best, but it's water none the less. Make a fire and use a coffee can to boil water if you have to.

I don't have crap for money and am a single parent of two daughters. Even I have enough goods in the pantry to last a month if we had to. Might not be what they want all the time, but if they were hungry they'd eat it.

Thank God we don't have the problems they do. But I wouldn't put a lot of effort into totally relying on anyone else for food and water in that kind of situation. Now not having any cigs or a good drink might have me a little on the edge.

[Valigator]

As I was skipping thru channels last nite, I come across Suzy Orman, you know the woman with all the financial tips....anyway she had a special on and the premise was preparing for disasters. It was very interesting....and she elaborated that more details were on her website...but the jest of it was...to get all your documents in order, SS cards, mortgage documents, insurance policies, birth certificates, tax statements, credit card numbers etc...her list is on the site...make copies..keep one set in a water/fire proof box and send another set to a friend or relative. Also make copies of keys to cars, boats etc....she said most people have papers scattered around or in file cabinets...and in a worse case scenario, no one will have time to grab them...makes sense to me...oh also..check your homeowners and if you have flood policies...she said in the wake of rising real estate prices....almost everyone is under insured...

She said to check out your homeowners especially, they have something called displacement clauses, it gives you a percentage, not an exact amount on relocating to another place in the event your home is destroyed...also if your home is blown off the face of the earth and you have a mortgage, you are still responsible for the mortgage payments...you might get a deferment of 30-60-90 days but thats it and you'll still have to make those payments up...:eek:

[skeeter@ccia.com]

Impressive all the help from everywhere...Val, where do you think all those gators laying in the swamps went?....Bet they are everywhere now...might need a gotor wrangler...I don't think most people realize when the word to evacuate came over, where does 1/3 of the USA evacuate to?...Unlike the few blocks in NY and how it was handled...good job by the way, this meant moving a few states....wow..I feel no matter all the bad we hear from the media, there has to be hundreds times that doing good and things will work out...it always does...I think Americans as a whole are strong and there will always be the stronger helping the weak. I hate it when I hear the race thing mentioned too..No way can this have anything to do with anything...is just a matter of who the majority of those involved were....God Bless America and keep the Pledge in the schools...after all...this is AMERICA. Maybe not quite as free as once was but still better than abroad.

[Valigator]

They lay low especially in windblown areas...I have come to think they hunt on smell and territory....the first couple of weeks into the harvest you were hardpressed to find anything but the wind was really blowing..guess that was the after-effects of Katrina and then Ophelia...now they are out a little more and we are starting to get them...Now 243. might have more knowledge than I about the farms...but my understanding is the farms take them out when they are smaller...hides are nicer and easier to make products from...belts etc....so I wouldnt figure there would be alot of 9-10-11 footers that got loose during the storm..any big boys out there were there already know what I mean? So I dont think you'll have alot of human interaction in that area...dogs and cats should look out though...and little kids...but my guess is they made it to some outlaying swamps ...thats why they have been around for millions of years...

Andrew, here was the worst storm prior to Katrina in Florida, you would be hardpressed to find any traces of it now these years later...the rebuilding brought the economy back up quickly..but was costly with the new codes...thats why its important to check your policies...most will only give you a 25 % ordinance increase..

[Valigator]

Oh also I forgot...she said policies have different deductibles for homes in coastal areas versus inland homes...another words your deductible could be 10 percent of the appraised value versus a 500 or 1000 dollar deductible on non-coastal homes...meaning if your house is considered coastal and its appraised at 400,000 dollars, you have a 40,000 deductable out of pocket before they ever pay a cent....how about those cookies?

and you can bet dollars to door-knobs what was considered coastal 20 years ago will change...:eek:

So if I were you, ya know how you get those little udates that read ammendment to your credit card notices/ dont be surprized to get some from your insurance companies....

[skeeter@ccia.com]

Oh boy the insurance companies and the flood plane and flood insurance will all surface soon....we here in our local town had the flood plane revised after last year. From an aerial view such as terraserver.com they drew a line along the Beaver River and called this the new flood plane. Anyone within this border had to get flood insurance or loose their financing from the banks. My sister,from the aerial view is only 350 yards from the Beaver River. But the elevation from the river to her house is over 1000 feet. Now at this stage of flooding we would see Noah pass by. It took lots to get this changed. The thousand dollars and more for flood insurance she was forced to pay would have paid for those that live a few feet from the creeks here but they choose to do so and I know lots that have to rebuild every year because of flooding...and they don't mind....gotta stick to our guns..or we all will get insurance rate increases.....