Fire Services Response During Hurricane Katrina and 9/11 - Research Paper Example

 Topic: Law Enforcement Response during Hurricane Katrina and 9/11 Introduction The United States was attacked on September 11, 2001, which was followed by many publications that expressed the various lessons that had been learned on how to adequately prepare to respond to major disasters of this magnitude. The years after the attack have seen a lot of money spent towards addressing the issues that were a challenge during and immediately after the attack such as the failures in communication as well as inter-government and inter-agency cooperation. This saw the creation of the department of homeland security, which was tasked with dealing with the federal bureaucracy through the demotion of Federal Emergency Management Agency. Different states came up with new emergency centers, training techniques, frameworks that guided organizations as well as different types of equipment that were supposed to assist in the preparedness in terms of disasters. The attack that happened on the United States soil was the main reason that the United States sent its soldiers to Afghanistan as well as Iraq. From the reactions that the United States government demonstrated after this attack, it can be conclude that it saw the need to improve the disaster response mechanisms already instituted and make them better. There were questions that were raised around the country immediately after the Katrina disaster about what the country had benefitted from the investments that it had made towards disaster preparedness. When the then United States George Bush paid a visit to the Gulf Coast which was heavily affected by Katrina, he was of the opinion that the lessons towards preparing for disasters had been learned and congratulated the FEMA Secretary for doing a good job. Ironically, only a few days later, the secretary decided to resign from his job and news that the disaster was being poorly handled started coming out through the newspapers. Issues associated with response In most of the disasters that take place all over the world, communication is usually lost in the very early stages of the disaster usually when it makes impact. Most of the interviews that took place after Katrina demonstrated that communication was lost very early when the disaster struck since telephone and electricity services were all cut off. In most of the cases, the services were not restored for several weeks. This lack of communication had a negative effect on the coordination and cooperation of the different agencies as well as organizations that were mandated to carry out different tasks responding to the disaster in the initial days and weeks. Different agencies had to resort to the use of the harm radios for communications since no channels were working properly. There are cases that were reported of people who in their homes with their families during the impact of Katrina since they had not been able to evacuate. Some called for assistance stating that they had helped their families to the roofs of their houses and tied them there while begging the authorities to assist in any way they could. In some of the situations, the rescuers could not attempt the rescue since they would have themselves faced death had they tried the rescue during the impact of Katrina. After the impact, most of the people that were on the roof were nowhere to be found and neither were their bodies since the houses were reduced to rubbles and only the foundation pads could be seen. What aggravated the situation was losing emergency equipment such as police vehicles and fire engines as well as ambulances in the disaster too. Rescue efforts could not begin immediately the disaster struck since the police, fire department and the emergency medical services were not able to reach the areas that were impacted by the disaster. The responders of the disaster had to use the private cars that were survived the disaster and were in usable condition to reach the areas where there were people who needed assistance and for fuel they had to siphon from the cars that destroyed and unusable. The responders were condemned for looting but in their defense, they stated that all they were trying to do was save lives and using these vehicles as well as siphoning the fuel from the ones that were unusable was the only way that they could carry out the duty at that particular time. Law enforcement during in response to Hurricane Katrina There were problems that were faced by law enforcement, before, during and after Hurricane Katrina was over that ranged from shifting duties that involved the control of crime as well as emergency relief to the destroying of important elements of the infrastructure used by the police. There was significant breakdown in the police communication and transport and the coordination that is required between the police and other first responders was nonexistent. As the Hurricane was approaching, many people were not able to leave their homes and a number of aspects of preparedness as well as response did not work in the way they were supposed to. Louisiana was the hardest hit by the Hurricane with almost eighty percent of the city being flooded and the rescue efforts that followed were slow while looting and violence escalated posing a huge problem to the law enforcement. Blames were directed at the police for not doing enough to stop the cases of looting and assisting those that were affected by the hurricane. The reports regarding the intensity of the hurricane had been inconsistent prior to it reaching the Gulf Coast, which made the preparedness that was in place hesitant. The emergency responders as well as the public did not get clear information regarding the hurricane and the police could not be able to clearly plan their response when the hurricane finally hit the Gulf Coast. There were problems in the structure of organization in the New Orleans police that would have significant impact on the level of preparedness of the law enforcement in this area. Disasters of the magnitude of Katrina clearly exhibit the role that is played by infrastructure in the institutions that are tasked with the duty of helping as well as protecting the public (Sims, 2007). The New Orleans police department before Katrina had the reputation of maintaining officers who were thought to be corrupt and some who were not educated while being poorly remunerated. Many of the officers in this department were white in spite of the fact that majority of the population of New Orleans is black which meant that the people who lived in the poor neighborhoods did not trust the police. The effects of the hurricane in New Orleans was a demonstration that disasters are mediated by social conditions since the conditions of the residents of the city who found it difficult to vacate were equated to those that exist in the undeveloped countries (Garrett, 2005). These people were not able to use neither the transportation system nor the social networks and those who bore the most brunt were the poor and the elderly. The designated areas that were set aside for the people that were evacuated were not able to deal with the huge number of people that turned up. The most significant problem that the police faced during the hurricane was a breakdown in communication capabilities as well as a lack of transport (Falk 2007). The officers had no other choice but to communicate mainly face to face since all other modern methods of communication had broken down. Consequently, the chain of command in the police department broke down and many of the officers carried out duties under their own command. When a disaster happens, the issues that deal with communications are amplified since the task that the police are mandated with is assisting the people who are affected by the disaster. Disaster policing is different from the control of crime and the ensuring that there is security since it is functional and is aimed at providing safety and aid. This functional orientation was hindered by the fact that the police did not have sufficient transport as they tried to deal with the disaster even though the department had received more than six hundred emergency in less than one hour after the hurricane had hit. There were many more emergency calls that were not answered as the infrastructure of the police department also suffered with the flooding of eight police stations. This left the police with inadequate supplies and they had to come up with a makeshift headquarter while the citizens responded to the lack of efficient policing by conducting their own rescue efforts. Since there was no clear coordination in the different levels of the government, there cooperation issues that were at the policing level were greatly amplified. Many other institutions that included the FBI as well as the US Marshal Service provided personnel and equipment as well as security during the disaster but there was no coordination in their actions since the methods that were employed for cooperation were more pragmatic than pre-coordinated. Apart from the New Orleans police department, other mechanisms of the criminal justice system were not prepared adequately for the storm (Garrett and Tetlow, 2006). There was no evacuation plan that existed in the prison system, the prison buildings lost their lighting as well as air conditioning at the beginning of the hurricane and soon the facilities were completely flooded. There was no evacuation of the inmates at the prison until seven days after the storm had taken place and when they were moved, they had to sleep on the ground with lack of access to basic facilities. The inmates were not adequately patrolled and many of them were not in a position to access legal counsel, which meant that they served extended sentences. After the storm had calmed down, there were periods that were characterized by unrest and violence in the moments when the police had put all their attention to safety and rescue efforts. The law enforcement was forced to shift back its attention to its normal duties that involve maintaining law and order as a result of the altered security situation (Frailing and Harper, 2007). After the storm had passed, looting was a major problem for the law enforcement since there was a breakdown in the social institutions and police officers watched without taking any action as looting took place. Some of the police officers took part in the looting themselves by breaking into shops in search for food as well as supplies. The looting that was taking place could be attributed to the poor economic conditions that were evident in most of the New Orleans neighborhoods. Factors that were associated with the disaster also escalated the opportunities for violence and disorder making the incidences of looting and fighting between citizens a rampant occurrence. Some of the people that were affected by the looting and the violence started carrying guns as a form of protection while others employed guards to make sure their homes were safe. Gangs on the other hand took advantage of the fact that the police were concentrating on the rescue of the people who were affected by the disaster to increase their criminal activities. The police operated in makeshift police stations that did not have sanitary facilities. The community had negative reactions to the fact the police were not in a good position to deal with all the issues had been brought about by the disaster. Although they were at the center of a lot of criticism, the members of the police force had to work with inadequate resources and they had to deal with their own personal losses since they also had homes and families in the city. When the violence and the looting continued to escalate, there was no point of the police arresting the culprits since there were no jails where they could be taken to and the court system had to depend on facilities that were improvised to carry out its duties. It would take several months before the defendants could be able to go to court even in the instances where their offenses where minor. Majority of the prosecutors had to work from their homes and the situation deteriorated to the point that some of them had to work from nightclubs. Paying public defenders became a problem since there was no revenue that was being realized from traffic tickets and many inmates that were in New Orleans did not have any access to a lawyer for more than a whole year. The devastation that the hurricane left in the New Orleans police departments will last a long time and one of them is the difficulty the department is facing in the recruitment to the police force since most officers resigned and other were fired ( Falk, 2007). The department tries to hire more officers through advertising and also offers the ones that are newly hired pay increases. Even though this is happening, cases of citizens being mistreated by the police are still coming up and police stations took a long time to move from the makeshift police stations. Conclusion The coming of the hurricane into New Orleans was not sufficiently anticipated since the intensity as well as the possible impact of the storm was not well reported. The police department did not have a clear and elaborate plan to deal with such a disaster and the officers were not given defined roles in terms of addressing the various attributes associated with the disaster. Throughout the history of the New Orleans criminal justice system, there had been a poor performance in terms of crime concerns and the implications exhibited themselves during the hurricane. After Katrina hit the city, there was insufficient response from the police, which was a result of the lack of communication and transportation, and these factors coupled with the stress that was added to the officers contributed to the lack of proper response. The first responders as well as the police also faced challenges when the disaster struck since they were naturally part of the community, which was affected by the hurricane. Dealing with the emotions during the disaster and after it has been addressed is a chief concern of police as well as rescue workers (Person, 2006). More problems came from poor response between the local and federal police as well as the emergency units where looting came up after the storm forcing the police to return to their normal duties of crime control at a time when the infrastructure was poor. This necessitated calling in of the military troops to help with the policing and deal with the disorder since the whole criminal justice system of New Orleans was in confusion. Even though the events that are associated with the disaster are extraordinary, the law enforcement should be adequately prepared to address national disasters as well as other phenomena that might cause disruptions to normalcy. The experiences that were are a result of Katrina in New Orleans can be used to come up with an efficient management system of the modern police organizations. References Falk, K. (2007), ‘New Orleans Gets a ‘Do-Over’: Storm Devastation Can’t Kill the Creative Spirit of the New Orleans Police Department’, Law Enforcement Technology, 34/10: 7883. Frailing, K., & Harper, D. (2007). Crime and hurricanes in New Orleans. The Sociology Of Katrina: Perspectives On A Modern Catastrophe, 51--68. Garrett, B., & Tetlow, T. (2006). Criminal justice collapse: The constitution after Hurricane Katrina. University Of Virginia Legal Working Paper Series, 44. Garrett, R. (2005). Walk through hell. Law Enforcement Technology, 32(10), 32--39. Person, C. (2006), ‘Alternatives to Debriefing: Utilizing Psychological First Aid after Hurricane Katrina’, Law Enforcement Executive Forum, 6/3: 151-158. Sims, B. (2007). 'The day after the Hurricane': Infrastructure, order, and the new orleans police department's response to Hurricane Katrina. Social Studies Of Science, 111--118. Read More