Lt. Gen. Steven Blum, chief of the National Guard Bureau:
"[A]rguably" a day or so of response time was lost due to the absence of the Mississippi National Guard's 155th Infantry Brigade and Louisiana's 256th Infantry Brigade, each with thousands of troops in Iraq.
Debbie Este:
...watched her own mother die as they waited for help she thought would never come.
For three days they waited, sweating and stripped nearly naked because of the 110 degree heat, with no food and running out of water. The rising water reached the attic and threatened the survival of anyone inside the yellow-sided, single-story house.
During half the time they were trapped, the body of Debbie's mom, Melissa Harold, 68, who didn't make it through the ordeal, lay lifeless on the attic floor.
Melissa Harold, a former newspaper reporter, passed away a day and a half after climbing into the attic. "We told her we loved her, and she said she loved us," Debbie said, in tears. "I told her I was sorry I couldn't help ... And she closed her eyes."
Democratic Rep. Gene Taylor of Mississippi:
the absence of the deployed Mississippi Guard units made it harder for local officials to coordinate their initial response.
"What you lost was a lot of local knowledge," Taylor said, as well as equipment that could have been used in recovery operations.
Donald Rumsfeld:
"Anyone who's saying that doesn't understand the situation."
From CNN here and here. Posted by binky at September 9, 2005 08:45 PM | TrackBack | Posted to Natural Disasters