The 10 Evolution mini-UAVs flying out of the New Orleans Naval Air Station and “[assessing] damage to oil and gas distribution, dikes, berms and other aspects of the region's infrastructure” are apparently part of the biggest civilian UAV deployment ever.
I think it's pretty clear that lack of high tech wasn't the biggest problem faced by the people of New Orleans when Katrina hit, and it's not the biggest problem faced by the survivors. I'm not sure what can be done to make things right, but this might be a start:
IMHO: the real problem is that the emergency radios were not restored ASAP; this meant that the police could not communicate at all, which meant increased looting and lack of information about where help was needed; in turn, it decreased morale, causing some officers to give up.
Posted by: PatrickG on September 8, 2005 09:05 PMObviously high tech was not the problem but one has to wonder, the issue of New Orleans being under sea level is/was an issue well known, are you sure they aren't any high tech solution to breaching levees ? I don't have an answer but because the issue is becoming more and more important (the whole country of Netherlands is mainly under sea level ) it probably requires our collective attention in more ways than one.
Posted by: Igor Carron on September 10, 2005 05:18 AM