Lessons From Katrina
Lessons From Katrina
Yesterday was the 7 year anniversary of the day Hurricane Katrina brought so much death and destruction to New Orleans. Once again, the best and brightest were unable to stop the flood waters from rising and massive losses in property from Hurricane Issac. The average elevation of the city is between 1 and 2 feet below sea level. At some point I would think that becomes uninsurable. We haven’t learned that lesson yet, but there are several lessons that we can take away from Katrina.
Hurricane Katrina opened the eyes of America to a new level of what it can look like when it hits the fan in our own country. The following video is good footage of the desperate situations that were present in the aftermath of Katrina. The video is from MSNBC. Anyone who reads Prepper Recon.com regularly will probably guess that I am not an avid MSNBC fan. In fact, this video epitomizes the leftist propaganda that they regularly broadcast. It is fitting as I believe the socialist mentality that MSNBC promotes and was a prime element in making the Katrina aftermath as bad as it could be.
Katrina Lesson 1- Get out when you can.
When an evacuation is issued, a prepper should have his bag packed, cash on hand and ready to leave in 15 minutes. This insures that you are one of the first people to get out of the area in the case of a disaster that requires a mass exodus. The people who have to run around the house looking for their important papers, find a bag to pack and think about what to put in it will also have to stop at the bank for money and then to get gas. The majority of these people will be in grid locked traffic for hours. Depending on the disaster, they may not make it.
Many people stayed because they didn’t have money to leave. Financial discipline is the foundation to preparedness. Everyone should have enough money for a bus ticket and a hotel. Whatever it takes, you should start an emergency fund of $1000. After that, you should build it to cover 6 months total expenses. Cut off your cable, quit eating out, find cheaper rent and work an extra job. Most of the people in the Katrina video look like they were capable of those things. You have to have an emergency fund. Your life may very well depend on it.
Katrina Lesson 2- Don’t get caught in the desperate masses.
I don’t like crowds when things are good because they can be very unpredictable. Every year people are trampled on Black Friday trying to save $5 on a toaster and end up loosing their life. This is how we ring in the Christmas season, our time of good will towards men. People leave their favorite sporting events and flip over cars in celebration. How do you expect a crowd to act when times are bad?
Katrina Lesson 3- Don’t depend on the government.
It is not their job to take care of you. It is your job to take care of you. I understand that there are people who are incapable of taking care of themselves. Taking care of them is the Churches job. Additionally the Church is much better equipped to determine who really needs help and who is working the system or just lazy. I will stop here because I could go on for days about the level of mission creep that our government is experiencing.
Tony Zumbado says in the video that the people in the convention center are well behaved and organized. I think they mixed up the footage because the people I saw were freaking out. I understand that this was a horrible event and the government should be in the position to help out in such a dire situation. We seem to be able to help out the rest of the world which, by the way, I also think is the job of the Church, not the government. And yes, I put my money where my mouth is, I support my Church financially so they are in the position to help where needed and I give to para-church organizations that provide relief around the world. I also have money confiscated from my paycheck on a weekly basis so the government can do something it was never intended to do. So it would be nice if they could get some water to dying Americans after a devastating hurricane, but it is not their job.
Our government has breed a culture of dependence that is totally unnatural. When disasters like Katrina strike and people need to depend on themselves and their community to pull through, they have lost the skill set to do so. This dependency is the greatest potential threat to our society. When the IMF steps in and imposes austerity measures on our country, like they did in Greece last year, like they did in Argentina in 2001, the gravy train ends. It is obvious that we are unwilling to vote for any leaders that are ready to make the hard choices to avoid a financial collapse, so that day is coming. Since we can’t make those choices,when it comes time for the IMF to bail us out, they will make them for us. That is when government programs like welfare and food stamps get decimated and every city will look like the New Orleans Convention Center after Katrina.
Remember to do what you can when you can. What you do today can significantly improve your chances for survival tomorrow.
Happy prepping!
