Chapter Chapter 3
Section Katrina's Beginnings
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Katrina's Beginnings
August 23, 2005
On Tuesday, August 23, the NWS reported Tropical Depression Twelve had formed over the Bahamas from the remnants of Tropical Depression Ten.12 The NHC released the first in what would be a series of sixty-one advisories over the next seven days reporting on and tracking the development of the storm.13
The Federal government began monitoring the storm as a potential hurricane shortly after the NWS announced Tropical Depression Twelve had formed. Federal department and agency Emergency Operation Centers (EOC)—bases used to coordinate and direct response activity—began to closely monitor NWS bulletins and incorporate them into their own updates and situation reports.
The U.S. Northern Command (USNORTHCOM), the military command charged with defending the U.S. homeland and providing military support to civil authorities, also began monitoring the Tropical Depression at its Operations Center in Colorado Springs, Colorado, on August 23.14
August 24, 2005
On Wednesday, August 24, the Tropical Depression strengthened into a Tropical Storm and was given the name Katrina, the eleventh named storm of the 2005 hurricane season.15 The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) activated its Hurricane Liaison Team (HLT), consisting of FEMA, NWS, and State and local officials.The HLT deploys to the National Hurricane Center to assist in the coordination of advisories with Federal, State, and local emergency management agencies, providing forecast updates and technical advice.16 FEMA Region IX was notified to prepare for possible back-up should Mississippi or Georgia be affected. USNORTHCOM also issued a Warning Order for supporting commands to prepare for requests for Department of Defense (DOD) assets should the need arise.17
August 25, 2005
Katrina continued to gain strength throughout the day on Thursday, as it approached the southeastern coast of Florida.18 At 3:30 pm edt, Katrina was upgraded to a Category 1 hurricane and forecast to make landfall in Florida.
Meanwhile, advisories issued by the NWS Tropical Prediction Center (TPC) and the NHC predicted Katrina would turn toward the Alabama-Florida panhandle area after it crossed Florida and entered the Gulf of Mexico.19 At 6:30pm edt, Hurricane Katrina made landfall in south Florida near the Miami-Dade and Broward County line, with sustained winds of up to 80 miles per hour and dropping as much as 14-16 inches of rain in some regions.20 The Florida landfall resulted in more than a dozen deaths,21 over 1.4 million power outages,22 and pockets of severe flooding. Damage costs in south Florida amounted to just under $2 billion,23 with an estimated $400 million in agricultural losses.24
Gulf Coast States and localities began hurricane preparations on Thursday, August 25, even as the storm approached its first landfall in Florida, by activating their emergency response elements, issuing emergency declarations, pre-positioning response assets, and planning for evacuations and sheltering. Because NWS advisories predicted Katrina would enter the Gulf and make landfall on the Northern Gulf Coast area, Alabama and Mississippi activated their Emergency Operations Centers (EOCs) to coordinate information and their State’s resources for emergency response operations.25
In preparation for Florida landfall, FEMA delivered 100 truckloads of ice to staging areas in Georgia, and thirty-five truckloads of food and seventy trucks of water to Palmetto, Georgia. Also, anticipating a potential second Gulf Coast landfall, FEMA pre-staged over 400 truckloads of ice, more than 500 truckloads of water, and nearly 200 truckloads of food at logistics centers in Alabama, Louisiana, Georgia , Texas, and South Carolina.26 This was the beginning of the pre-staging efforts that increased to the largest pre-positioning of Federal assets in history by the time Hurricane Katrina made its second landfall on August 29, 2005.27 At this time, FEMA placed Rapid Needs Assessment and Emergency Response Teams – Advance Elements (ERT-As) on alert.An ERT-A is “the portion of the Emergency Response Team (ERT) that is the first group deployed to the field to respond to a disaster incident.”28 FEMA also conducted their first video teleconference, a call held each day at noon from August 25 until well after landfall. These video teleconferences helped synchronize Federal, State, and local responders and were a means of defining and coordinating assistance and support needs.29
Numerous private sector entities took action as well. Norfolk Southern Railroad, for example, recognized the potential impact of the loss of certain key bridges and pre-staged repair barges in order to be able to move in quickly to make repairs after the hurricane made landfall.The Cargill Corporation, an agricultural products and services company, also pre-positioned freighters offshore so that it could continue shipping grain internationally immediately after landfall.
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