And FEMA didn't know what to expect?
What I find amazingly distressing is the level of surprise expressed by FEMA officials in the aftermath of what they have referred to as a "perfect storm" of events that resulted from Katrina.
In fact, Dr. Max Mayfield, director of the National Hurricane Center, clearly recalls the briefings which were given to both the FEMA director and the director of Homeland Security prior to the storm.
Worse yet, in a FEMA press release that followed an emergency preparedness exercise that was conducted last July (2004), the assumptions that were made during the exercise eerily predict the resulting disaster:
Hurricane Pam brought sustained winds of 120 mph, up to 20 inches of rain in parts of southeast Louisiana and storm surge that topped levees in the New Orleans area. More than one million residents evacuated and Hurricane Pam destroyed 500,000-600,000 buildings. Emergency officials from 50 parish, state, federal and volunteer organizations faced this scenario during a five-day exercise held this week at the State Emergency Operations Center in Baton Rouge.The exercise used realistic weather and damage information developed by the National Weather Service, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the LSU Hurricane Center and other state and federal agencies to help officials develop joint response plans for a catastrophic hurricane in Louisiana.
UPDATE: The Washington Post has a new piece about the preparedness exercise that took place last year and the lack of heed to the results of the exercise.