Making Use of Cruiseships to Assist.......

[kryos]

I wonder how many of the old ships laid up at Freeport could be powered up and used -- just once -- to take people from New Orleans to Galveston or some other port, where they could be transported out?

Good point. Doesn't have to be an actual "in service" cruise ship. An old one would do just as well. Maybe tugs could be used to "help them along" to New Orleans and then to Galveston, if necessary? Don't know if that's possible ... but it's a thought.

 

Blue skies ...

 

--rita

[RevNeal]

Actually, I would imagine that they would be serviceable under their own power ... they're just not "up to code" legally or, if they are, they're too far out of date to be attractive to our market (not economical to maintain or draw passengers). But they will still be fixed with beds and such, and would be perfect as floating dorms or to move people out of the area.

[bruceh4]

By the time you could get some ships there the need will be over. Also how do you get people on the ships? The closest that the US Navy can get to NO is 80 miles. The Mississippi is unnavigable with sunken boats and other debris, and channel markers out of place. Getting people to a cruise ship by helicopter out in the gulf is worse than busing them out. At this point there are not enough helicopters available to even do search and rescue let alone act as ferries. Unfortunatley this is a disaster of biblical proportions but as the rest of the nation gets cranked up and more help arrives the situation will improve. I saw the same thing last year on a much smaller scale here in south florida. I was onsite in Punta Gorda the next day after Charley and saw the same pictures and human suffering. But day by day as more and more help and supplies arrived things slowly improved. Being a ham radio operator I rode with a fire chief from Key West to provide radio communications for search and rescue. I cant tell you how many hardships we saw. In one instance our fire fighters entered a home and found a man sitting on his couch having a heart attack, with no phones or anything else he could not get help. Unfortunatley in this computer age fire and police radios need a central computer to operate. Without this computer they have no communications. On the other hand we ham's are still using radios that can talk to one another and that is why a call went out for our help. This same problem has now occured in NO. So it takes time to get these things cranked up and onsite. Lets all pray for the relief of people in the affected areas and DONATE to the charitable organizations that are helping out.

[dwr777]

I AM NOT A BIGOT But

what cruise line would turn a beautiful ship into a homeless shelter for an indefinite period of time and probably only get minimum payback from the government and then be required to refurbish the ship afterwords.

 

If it was your ship would you do it??????????????????????????

 

 

I feel compelled to respond to the above....I AM NOT A BIGOT?? It sounds like you are. I wasn't aware that only minorities would need temporary housing help. A beautiful ship into a homeless shelter? Do you have any idea what these people are up against in the weeks, months and possibly years ahead? My goodness.

[etoile]

"I think that those of use who can afford $$$ to cruise and who regularly talk about our verandah cabins and our bar bills and our shorex and have countdown clocks and/or past cruises in our signatures can *easily* afford to send the Disaster Relief group of our choice a significant amount of money (three figures) to aid our own people. Why wait for other nations?"

A charity that not many people will be thinking about is Noah's Wish. They are dedicated to rescuing the animals who have been affected by Katrina. The Humane Society is also mobilizing to assist with animal rescue. Yes, humans are probably more important, and indeed they have many organizations helping them. The animals, though, have only HSUS and Noah's Wish. If you can afford to donate to either of these, please do.

[RevNeal]

By the time you could get some ships there the need will be over.

 

Bruce, I'm thinking long term, not short. I'm thinking about 3 and 6 months from now ... I'm thinking about housing for the gasoline refinery workers whose homes are GONE but the refineries are still there and need operators. I'm thinking about housing for 3 months to half a year that will be needed before many people will be able to move back into the area. Some of the older and out-of-service ships might be useful for such needs. And, by the time they could be reactivated and brought into useful position off the coast and in ports it will NOT be over ... a months from now this will not be over. This won't be over when I go on my next cruise ... 67 days from now. This won't be over when I'm on the maiden voyage of the Noordam. This is going to take a long time, and there will be a critical need for temporary housing for millions of people for a long time to come. Some of these ships might be useful to that end. True, just drop in the bucket ... but every bit helps.

 

As for giving ... YES, that is an absolute necessity. But more than that is needed. I live in an area where we've got refugees pouring in. They're in need of a roof over their heads, baths, clean clothing, food, medical attention ... just throwing money isn't enough. I just got home from helping to coordinate, cook, and serve the lunch feed at Dallas Reunion Arena, where we've got thousands of people sheltered. If people live within the zone of refugee relocation, in addition to money there is great need for hands to serve. If people are medical professionals of ANY kind, there is a great need for them. Retired teachers are needed to help set up classes for refugee kids. We can't allow these children to lose half a year or a whole year of schooling!

 

There is MUCH to do other than just throwing money. But money is needed too.

[RevNeal]

If anyone happens to be a Methodist, or if you just want to give through a church agency but don't know which one, I suggest UMCOR:

 

http://gbgm-umc.org/umcor/

http://www.methodistrelief.org

http://gbgm-umc.org/umcor/kits.cfm

Health Kit Appeal

[bruceh4]

Bruce, I'm thinking long term, not short. I'm thinking about 3 and 6 months from now ... I'm thinking about housing for the gasoline refinery workers whose homes are GONE but the refineries are still there and need operators. I'm thinking about housing for 3 months to half a year that will be needed before many people will be able to move back into the area. Some of the older and out-of-service ships might be useful for such needs. And, by the time they could be reactivated and brought into useful position off the coast and in ports it will NOT be over ... a months from now this will not be over. This won't be over when I go on my next cruise ... 67 days from now.

 

Rev Neal, I understand what you are saying but what I saw FEMA do here last year was once the cleanup was over they moved in thousands of mobile homes for people to live in. In fact at the present time there is a staging area just down the road from my house with these mobile homes. I am sure there are many others around that they will move when the time comes. I think it makes for a better family situation to be on land back in your old neighborhood then floating around the Gulf. There will be many workers needed to assist in the clean up and home repairs will go on for years. In Port Charlotte here there are still many people who will tell you they still have a "blue roof". That is a tarp covering the roof. Building material's are still in short supply.

[RevNeal]

Rev Neal, I understand what you are saying but what I saw FEMA do here last year was once the cleanup was over they moved in thousands of mobile homes for people to live in. In fact at the present time there is a staging area just down the road from my house with these mobile homes. I am sure there are many others around that they will move when the time comes. I think it makes for a better family situation to be on land back in your old neighborhood then floating around the Gulf. There will be many workers needed to assist in the clean up and home repairs will go on for years. In Port Charlotte here there are still many people who will tell you they still have a "blue roof". That is a tarp covering the roof. Building material's are still in short supply.

 

Bruce, I don't think the magnitude of this is registering. While what you describe may be accurate for Mississippi, Alabama, and other areas -- where hundreds of thousands of these mobile homes will be needed, not just thousands (some of the Aerial footage looks like the massive destruction from Hiroshima ... for dozens and dozens of miles) -- there will still be about 700,000 people for who returning to their homes will NOT BE POSSIBLE for about 3 months, MINIMUM, and perhaps quite a bit longer.

 

It's going to take more than a month JUST to pump out the water, another month to clean up the sewage mess and the rotting decay of dead bodies, animals, and such. This is going to take MANY MONTHS, and be a hazmat nightmare of porportions that make previous disasters look like a cake walk. It will be a very long before a substantial portion of the population will be able to move back into the New Orleans area. We won't be setting them up with temporary housing on their old home sites ... we will have to put many of them (those without families to go live with) in refugee camps for upwards of 4 or 5 months.

 

The magnitude of this dwarfs anything you saw last year or anything that anyone has seen, here in the US, for a very long time.

[SantaAna,CA]

Funny, that thought crossed my mind also, about bringing in cruiseships to be used to help out the survivors. Then I realized: they are all out cruising someplace, full of passengers, and have weeks and weeks booked with more passengers. So, they couldn't just toss their paying customers off.

 

Incredible disaster by the way; I don't know if I've ever seen anything like it in this country, and I'm 54 years old....

 

By the way, I just found out that New Orleans was built BELOW sea level. Is that so? What Brainiac thought of that????

 

Jane

[RevNeal]

By the way, I just found out that New Orleans was built BELOW sea level. Is that so? What Brainiac thought of that????

 

Jane, when New Orleans was originally founded it was above sea level, however it has been sinking at about 2/3 to 1 inch per year for the past century as the delta-ground underneath it compacts.

[Krazy Kruizers]

I read somewhere today that the weather forecasters have upped the number of named huricanes and storms for this year. Looks to awful. I hope they are wrong.

[bluehorizonlover123]

I just dont see how Carnival could do this. All their ships are pre booked and are full. They are probaby currently scrambling to find other ports to sail out of. But their obligation is to their paying customers who have already paid for their cruises.

[JimVrhovac]

As a matter of fact I can imagine what these people are going through.

 

If you read back in the posts you will note that I am retired Military and spent many years advising national guards in several states and have been through more natural disasters than I care to remember or count. And the fact that My own house wash torn up badly by Hurricane Charlie last year.

 

Charlie hit on fridy and saturday morning I was not sitting around feeling sorry for myself asking where is the government. I called a roofer friend and set it up with him and then went to work seing my patients and making sure they were ok. When I got home my neighbors and some friends were at my house removing insulation and the ceilings that had fallen down and putting up tarps on my roof. I did not go and steal the supplies from Home Depot. I purchased them in an orderly civilized manner.

 

I can talk as someone who has been there and done that.............

 

Cruise ships are not a practical solution to the housing problem.

 

As I stated earlier:

 

GOD CAN DO THINGS OVERNIGHT BUT US HUMANS TAKE A LITTLE LONGER AND SOMETIMES WE MAKE MISTAKES.........

 

Jim

[RevNeal]

Jim,

 

What if all your patients were either dead or evacuated, your home was underwater, and you were evacuated 380 miles away and told it would be about 3 months, if not 6, before you would have a chance to go home and start to rebuild? I think I have some idea of what you would do ... you're a person of high integrity and a never-quit attitude ... but the circumstances this time are somewhat different from what happened when Charlie hit.

[annebill]

How about this: all of us who have cruised a lot sacrifice the cost of one future cruise and give the money to a relief organization to help all those poor folks who had little to begin with and now have nothing, NOTHING, nothing at all. No job, no home no hope unless we help. People can pontificate here all they want, but I say put your money where your mouth is. Would you give up a cruise to help ???? As the relief people say, what they need now is MONEY. If we are not ready to make a meaningfull sacrifice of our blessings--well, stop pontificating on the boards to make ourselves feel better. And we sure don't need cheap political digs and finger pointing at this time.

[RevNeal]

People can pontificate here all they want, but I say put your money where your mouth is. Would you give up a cruise to help ???? As the relief people say, what they need now is MONEY. If we are not ready to make a meaningfull sacrifice of our blessings--well, stop pontificating on the boards to make ourselves feel better. And we sure don't need cheap political digs and finger pointing at this time.

 

What makes you think we're NOT doing much of what you suggest, and MORE? How many refugees did YOU help feed today? With your hands as well as your pocket book???

 

The only person I see finger-pointed is YOU.

 

I'm sorry ... I'm exhausted and need to get some sleep.

[bookworm0911]

I love this board, but there are times that there are posts that are impossible to read without first rage and then almost feeling sorry for anyone who could have so little understanding for people literally dying in the streets today.

 

I don't think most of us know what all we would do in the same circumstances, but I do know if I and my family were starving, I would do whatever I had to for survival. And I mean whatever I had to.

[sail7seas]

I heard a serious news report and think it was NBC. Their report indicated that Carnival is 'talking' with the government. IF ships are to be used, I got the impression they would be used for housing for relief workers....not for the victims.

 

All of these Red Cross, FEMA, Salvation Army etc etc people need a place to lay their heads when they finally have the chance for rest. The cruise ships are being considered for that use------is my impression.

[sail7seas]

Yes, Bookworm.....it is the human instinct to survive. Isn't it a law of nature? The survival of the fittest?

[bruceh4]

Jim,

 

... but the circumstances this time are somewhat different from what happened when Charlie hit.

I disagree with your statement, things are not different then when Charlie hit, they are just on a much larger scale. The folks that are STILL living in FEMA trailers in the setup camps here in South Florida would also disagree very much with you on this one. Because of the magnitude of the damage with Kristina it is getting much more media attention then Charlie did. But the results are still the same. Both are a human tragedy. And unfortunately what we are seeing in LA, MS and AL is that the poor suffer the most in a disaster. That goes for any state in which it occurs not just NO or the outlying area's.

[bookworm0911]

It certainly is different if you have food and water available, dry clothes, some communication, money to purchase the necessities and some stores open, especially a Home Depot, of course.

 

That's a far cry from having nothing- no food, no water to drink, no possibility of getting any on your own, no home,, no transportation, no money and no way to get it with everything destroyed, filthy dirty water up to your chest and dead bodies floating by. This is the worst natural disaster this country has ever suffered, Charlie included.

[JimVrhovac]

Don't know about your feelings but the thing that is frustrating me the most right now is the situation in New Orleans and the lawless gangs that are roming the streets and the lack of (or what appears to be the lack) of orginazation.

 

What may be needed is an organization that is in place and accustomed to working together, trained and disciplined.

 

Lot of you may not like this statement but I would like to see an ACTIVE ARMY Division (or higher) command structure brought in with Trained, disciplined, active army troops to establish order and get things orgainzed.

 

They have the personnel, vehicles, any supply system to be self supporting and the expertise AND EXPERIENCE to get things orgnized rapidly.

 

The major problem here is this country does not like, and probably would not stand for, active military personnel taking control over a civilian population.

 

Don't know the answer but something has to be done before it gets completely out of hand. Accouding to the new tonight they have stopped evacuating the hospitals in the city because of sniper fire.

 

Wish I had the answer but I don't............

 

One persons opinion

 

Jim

[lizzielady]

http://www.carnival.com/CMS/static_templates/weather_update.aspx

[RevNeal]

I disagree with your statement, things are not different then when Charlie hit, they are just on a much larger scale.

 

Yes, elsewhere in LA, MS and AL the conditions are not very different, just on a much larger (and horrific) scale. I do not want to minimize any of the disaster that's happened in MS, AL, or elsewhere in LA, but what has been happening in New Orleans since Monday night has not happened in recent history in the United States. If you deny this then you simply are not paying attention of what is going on.

 

The City is UNDER WATER and will remain underwater for more than a month; after that the clean up operations will take months and very few of its citizens will be able to return to rebuild during this period of time. Just in New Orleans there will be thousands dead ... we don't know how many casualties there will be, but it's going to be far more than anyone has dared imagine. There are tens of thousands of people trapped in the city with no water, no food, no dry place to sleep, and there are roving gangs of hoods, thieves, and vermin preying on them. No, Bruce, this is more than just a difference in scale, it's an order of magnitude greater. New Orleans, as we have know it, is no more.

 

I spent a goodly part of yesterday and today in meetings with Red Cross and city disaster officials here in Dallas trying to figure out how to provide shelter, food, support for the refugees already here, plus the 25,000 or more we can expect to show up over the next few days. I also spent time working the food line, serving corn to a few thousand people, and then another 3 hours sitting, counseling, and praying with distraught people. Many of the people here now left before the storm but are terrified about their relatives left back in New Orleans. Others which arrived today by car were people who managed to get out over Tuesday and Wednesday; the stories they told were unreal ... they admitted that it took threatening the hoodlums with guns to keep their car and escape. Hospitals are surrounded by crowds of looters, trying to steal ambulances, drugs, water, and supplies. There are people hijacking cars, shooting at relief helicopters and boats. There is no governing authority and no order.

 

This wasn't just a hurricane which blows through, tears builds and infrastructre to bits, floods the shore with storm surge ... and then goes away. It was a hurricane which did all that, and then was followed by a major flood of a major city ... and that hasn't gone away. As Secretary Chertoff said tonight, this is far worse and very different from anything we've faced before.