Rita Exposes Evacuation Problems

Storm Demonstrates Difficulty Of Evacuating Metropolitan Area

(AP) 
White House press secretary Scott McClellan on Saturday rejected the notion that there were problems with Houston's evacuation and said the president was told it had gone well. He also stressed that states are responsible for evacuations, although the federal government has a role to assist local officials.

"This was an unprecedented number of people who were being evacuated," McClellan said Sunday. "And they got a large number of people out of there.

"Obviously from situations like this you learn lessons and you look at ways to improve in the future. Everybody understands the importance of assessing how things worked and taking steps to improve in the future."

Local preparations vary and in some cases are nonexistent:

New York City officials plan to rely heavily on mass transit to get people out of the city.

Los Angeles officials concede they don't have proper plans for a mass evacuation or shelter for those who are left homeless by an earthquake or terrorist attack.

Washington had a mass evacuation drill after this year's Independence Day fireworks on the National Mall, which revealed some glitches that officials say they are working to fix.

Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius has ordered officials in her state to identify by name everyone likely to be bypassed in an evacuation.

Milwaukee leaders realized they have misplaced their evacuation plan, devised during the Cold War.

"If this isn't a wake up call for real disaster planning, I don't know what will be," Cressey said.

The evacuation before Rita was much more successful than it was in Mississippi and Louisiana as Katrina approached — in large part because citizens seemed to take the danger more seriously after seeing so many people stranded in flooded New Orleans.

"The fact is, we've never had an evacuation this size before: 2.7 million people," said Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas.

"Maybe that should have been handled on a different time basis, but the good news is that people ultimately did get out," he said. "And fortunately Rita did the rest by taking a right-hand turn and avoiding the major population centers in our state."