Running head: COMMUNICATION FAILURES OF HURRICANE KATRINA RELIEF

Communication Failures of Hurricane Katrina Relief Richard Groner Southern New Hampshire University

COMMUNICATION FAILURES OF HURRICANE KATRINA RELIEF Introduction On August 29th, 2005, Hurricane Katrina, a category 5 hurricane, hit the city of New Orleans, Louisiana. It caused the levees to fail, flooded eighty percent of the city, killed 1500 people, and caused $80 billion in damages. It was the costliest natural disaster in U.S. history

(Shore, 2009). What followed as relief efforts amounted to the Keystone Cops jumping to the rescue. Rescue efforts were poorly planned, poorly coordinated and poorly executed. Even basic needs could not be met for the citizens who were caught in the middle of the disaster. It became clear rather quickly that there was no one in charge of the relief efforts despite the fact that Michael Brown, Director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, was tasked with those duties from a federal level. While many agencies and organizations were trying to send relief to New Orleans, there was no clear person or group coordinating the efforts and the entire effort failed. Even the White House failed to acknowledge that the levees had failed until 24 hours after that had actually happened (Campen, 2005). This paper will look at the communication around the relief efforts after Katrina and study what happened as communication efforts failed and relief for the citizens did not happen or was slow to arrive. It will also look at improvements that could have been made, or that can be made, so that a future tragedy will see a much better coordinated relief effort. New Orleans The city of New Orleans, Louisiana at an average elevation that is approximately six feet below sea level (Below, Dierich,Erickson, Kjos, 2006). The city is surrounded by levees which protect it from Lake Pontchartrain, the Mississippi River, and also the Gulf of Mexico. The levees are man made and, while they normally protect the water from entering the city, once it does, the levees create a bowl that makes it difficult to get the water out (Below, et al. 2006).

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The potential of a disaster striking the city has been noted for many years and has been referred to as the New Orleans scenario. Prior to Hurricane Katrina hitting the city, the New Orleans scenario had been ranked as one of the most critical potential disasters facing the United States (Moynihan, 2009). Preparedness Timeline On Tuesday, August 23rd, a tropical depression was observed by the National Weather Service and by Thursday, August 25th, it had been upgraded to a tropical storm. As the storm grew in strength, the governors of Louisiana and Mississippi, on Friday, August 26th, declared states of emergency. On Saturday, August 27th, President George Bush declared a state of emergency and both the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and state responders began 24 hour operations in preparation for the Hurricane. Finally, on Sunday, August 27th, the mayor of New Orleans declared a mandatory evacuation and the Superdome was opened as a refuge of last resort. Hurricane Katrina made landfall at New Orleans around 6 a.m. on Monday morning, August 29th (Moynihan, 2009). Despite nearly seven days of preparations and agencies from both the state of Louisiana and the federal government being involved before the Hurricane hit, what followed after the storm was a failure in delivery of relief and communication on a grand scale. Communication between Agencies There were as many as 500 different organizations involved in sending relief and involved in the recovery efforts after the Hurricane (Moynihan, 2009). These organizations were a combination of federal government, state and local government, and a vast assortment of private and volunteer agencies with various specialities and missions in responding to the needs of New Orleans. Of all the agencies involved, four were major contributors and were assigned

COMMUNICATION FAILURES OF HURRICANE KATRINA RELIEF primary tasks in disaster relief. These four are 1) the White House, 2) the Federal Emergency Management Association, which is a division of the Department of Homeland Security, 3)

Louisiana State officials, and 4) New Orleans officials (Shore, 2009). Each of these four groups has their own independent organizational structure, leaders, communication policies and charter. While each is set up to operate independently, they are not set up to interact with each other and there is/was no clear leadership chain of command or primary leader to manage and coordinate relief efforts (Shore, 2009). There was also no clear communication network for multiple agencies to use to coordinate efforts and transfer information. The National Response Plan of 2004 was created by the Department of Homeland Defense to formalize the roles and responsibilities of federal agencies in crisis response. The Plan calls for a series of Emergency Support Functions for various federal agencies to provide support to FEMA. FEMAs role in large scale disasters is to act as a coordinator, orchestrating all the capabilities of the federal government and working with state responders (Moynihan, 2009). In the case of post Katrina relief the crisis grew to such a large scale. The agencies tasked with providing coordination and relief were so under resourced, and there was a complete lack of command structure, and the result was that the entire process was unable to function efficiently or quickly. The National Response Plan makes the Federal Coordinating Officer (FCO) the federal response commander. The FCO forms a unified command with the state coordinating officer. The Principle Federal Official (PFO) is tasked with being the eyes and ears of the Department of Homeland Defense on the ground, but under the National Response Plan of 2004, the PFO does not make operational decisions. Michael Brown was the PFO however he rejected this role (Moynihan, 2009). When he was replaced, the new PFO, Admiral Thad Allen, established a separate command and made operational decisions without working through the

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FCO. The problem was resolved when Allen was appointed PFO and FCO (Moynihan, 2009). The plan also did not address communication and interaction with private and volunteer agencies that became involved in relief efforts (Campen, 2005). One of the most visual examples of communication failure was with Michael Brown, the chief of FEMA, who received an email from a FEMA employee in New Orleans two days after the hurricane hit. In the email, the FEMA employee wrote that the situation was well past critical, that many people were near death, and there was a serious shortage of food and water at the Superdome. The response from Mr. Brown was: Thanks for the update. Anything specific I need to do or tweak? Clearly either Brown did not understand the gravity of the situation from the email or he chose to ignore it (Shore, 2009). While a plan did exist for crisis management, it was not followed and did not encompass all of the issues that resulted from the hurricane. Communication networks were not defined or created, and no plan was in place to cover the lack of cell phone, land line and internet communication that existed after the power went out from the hurricane. A lack of timely and effective communication between all the involved agencies was clearly one of the main shortcomings of the response efforts (Gheytanchi, Joseph, Gierlack, Kimpara, Housley, Franco, Beutler, 2007).

Lessons Learned There are several lessons to be learned regarding communication issues from post Hurricane Katrina. First, the more agencies and parties involved in the efforts, the greater the communication challenge will be. If all the agencies are not managed effectively, too much time

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can be devoted to resolving jurisdictional conflicts and not enough time will be devoted to real issues. Second, avoid selective participation, which might minimize interruptions but can also lock out any avenue of new data. Third, a clear chain of command and clear communication lines must be established and followed (Shore, 2009). Fourth, communication in relief efforts must encompass a host of private, commercial, and military communications technologies and systems. The sheer magnitude and complexity of management and control argues for federal leadership. Fifth, logistic support should be based on a push system, not a pull system. In the case of Katrina, many supplies were available but were waiting for someone from the command center to pull them into the efforts. Needed supplies should be pushed into the area with the chain of command handling distribution (Campen, 2005). Conclusion The relief efforts after Hurricane Katrina were nearly as disastrous as the hurricane itself. While there are many reasons for the failure, and a few hundred pages could be written on the total process, the lack of a communication network was a large part of the issue. There was no real leader coordinating the relief efforts and individual agencies were not communicating with each other. The result of the lack of communication was the doubling of efforts in some places while other parts of the city were completely ignored. Help was needed in areas but no one was aware of the need. In some instances, the needs were known but were ignored. Success would have been accomplished if there had been a communication structure available to coordinate the efforts of the relief agencies as well as a central figure in command. The National Response Plan of 2004 was an attempt to establish a protocol for relief efforts and while the framework may be sound, in practice the plan showed many flaws and room for improvement. A successful plan would establish a chain of command, a method of communication both up and down the chain,

COMMUNICATION FAILURES OF HURRICANE KATRINA RELIEF and a definition of what agency types will cover certain aspects such as search and rescue,

policing the area, delivery and distribution of supplies, and coordinating the refugees and victims of the event. In an attempt to improve the National Response Plan and include these types of improvements, Senate bill S.1725 was established (Campen, 2005). Communication is an integral part of everything we do in our lives and its importance in something as complex as hurricane relief cannot be overstated. We must continue to revise and improve communication at all levels so that disaster relief is clearly spelled out and can be implemented with precision and speed.

References Shore, B. (2009) Hurricane Katrina Retrieved from http://globalprojectstrategy.com/lessons/case.php?id=9 Campen, A. (2005) Hurricane Katrina Represents a Failure to Communicate Retrieved from http://www.afcea.org/content/?q=node/1062

COMMUNICATION FAILURES OF HURRICANE KATRINA RELIEF Below, C., Dierich, C., Erickson, K., Kjos, R. (2006) Environmental Hazards - Storm Surge Induced Flooding in New Orleans. Retrieved from http://www.uwec.edu/jolhm/eh3/group7/WhyNOVulnerable.htm

Moynihan, D. (2009) The Response to Hurricane Katrina Retrieved from http://irgc.org/wpcontent/uploads/2012/04/Hurricane_Katrina_full_case_study_web.pdf Shore, B. (2009) Hurricane Katrina Retrieved from http://globalprojectstrategy.com/lessons/case.php?id=9 Gheytanchi, A., Joseph, L., Gierlach, E., Kimpara, S., Housley, J. Franco, Z., Beutler, L. (2007) Twelve Failures of the Hurricane Katrina Response and How Psychology Can Help. Retrieved from http://pn8vx3lh2h.scholar.serialssolutions.com/?sid=google&auinit=A&aulast=Gheytanchi&atitl e=The+dirty+dozen:+Twelve+failures+of+the+Hurricane+Katrina+response+and+how+psychol ogy+can+help.&id=doi:10.1037/0003066X.62.2.118&title=American+psychologist&volume=62&issue=2&date=2007&spage=118&i ssn=0003-066X