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| Curbside service: Firefighters caught some rest Tuesday after battling wildfires near San Diego. Lucy Nicholson/Reuters |
In fire's path, lessons learned
FEMA and other US agencies seem to have improved their emergency response since the 2005 Katrina fiasco.
By Daniel B. Wood | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitorand Candice Reed | Contributor
from the October 25, 2007 edition
Page 1 of 2
Los Angeles and San Diego - In a dark corridor of Qualcomm Stadium, Jennifer Dillon of Rancho Bernardo, Calif., watches her 6-year-old daughter Molly sleep on a cot supplied by the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Mother and daughter are surrounded by evacuees from across San Diego, most of whom tote a few items – shirts, towels, stuffed animals – inside backpacks or shoulder bags.
"This time around, the county was much more prepared," says Ms. Dillon, who had evacuated her home once before, during huge fires five years ago.
Others echo her gratitude for an improved local-government response, even amid the biggest mass evacuation – at least 500,000 people – in California's history. Now, attention is shifting to the federal government's performance, with this question uppermost: Have US agencies learned since their botched response to hurricane Katrina in 2005?
With a few exceptions, the answer appears to be a resounding yes, according to many relief organizations, local officials, volunteers, fire victims, and disaster management specialists.
"They do seem to have learned a lot from Katrina and the 2003 fires here," says Richard Carson, an economics professor at University of California, San Diego, who studies governmental agency response to emergencies. "They saw the fire coming and plotted it out and moved people out just in time."
Stung by congressional criticism in the aftermath of Katrina and two formal reports assessing FEMA failures, the agency has responded with vastly improved command-and-control procedures, says Chris Reynolds, a professor and program manager for emergency and disaster management at American Military University in Tampa, Fla.
"FEMA is doing everything right this time around," he says, pointing out its evacuation plans, and the early deployment of out-of-state firefighters, military, National Guard, and firefighting technology.
It quickly set up a 24-hour emergency operations center, a dozen Emergency Support Function (ESF) teams, and interagency field offices for the Marines, the Navy, and the National Guard.
The Defense Department has authorized about 1,500 California National Guardsmen to support firefighting efforts there as well as another 100 Defense Department civilians who are actively engaged in fighting the wildfires.
Additionally, about 500 active-duty marines from the Camp Pendleton, Calif., Marine base have been tapped to help fight the fires but have yet to go because they have not been asked. Another 17,000 California National Guardsmen are also standing by for possible deployment to help fight fires.
"We've been … seeing for ourselves the difference between now and the Katrina situation, and the people here have food, water, and even entertainment," said R. David Paulison, FEMA's director, while on a tour of Qualcomm Stadium Tuesday.
"We won't desert you," added Homeland Security Chief Michael Chertoff.
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