1

Executive Summary

Hurricane Katrina:

A Nation Still 

Unprepared
2

Executive Summary

Hurricane Katrina was an extraordinary act of nature that spawned a human tragedy. It was the most destructive natural disaster in American history, laying waste 

to 90,000 square miles of land, an area the size of the United Kingdom. In Mississippi, the storm surge obliterated coastal communities and left thousands destitute. New 

Orleans was overwhelmed by fl ooding. All told, more than 1,500 people died. Along the 

Gulf Coast, tens of thousands suff ered without basic essentials for almost a week.

But the suff ering that continued in the days and weeks aft er the storm passed did not happen in a vacuum; instead, it continued longer than it should have because of – and was in 

some cases exacerbated by – the failure of government at all levels to plan, prepare for, and 

and respond aggressively to the storm. Th ese failures were not just conspicuous; they were 

pervasive. Among the many factors that contributed to these failures, the Committee found 

that there were four overarching ones:

1. Long-term warnings went unheeded and government offi cials neglected their duties to prepare 

for a forewarned catastrophe;

2. Government offi cials took insuffi cient actions 

or made poor decisions in the days immediately 

before and aft er landfall;

3. Systems on which offi cials relied on to support 

their response eff orts failed; and

4. Government offi cials at all levels failed to provide eff ective leadership.

Th ese individual failures, moreover, occurred against a 

backdrop of failure, over time, to develop the capacity for 

a coordinated, national response to a truly catastrophic 

event, whether caused by nature or man-made. 

Th e results were tragic loss of life and human suff ering on a massive scale, and an undermining of confi dence in our governments’ ability to plan, prepare for, and respond to 

national catastrophes. 

Eff ective response to mass emergencies is a critical role of every level of government. It is a 

role that requires an unusual level of planning, coordination, and dispatch among governments’ diverse units. Following the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, this country 

went through one of the most sweeping reorganizations of the federal government in history. While driven primarily by concerns of terrorism, the reorganization was designed to 

strengthen our nation’s ability to address the consequences of both natural and man-made 

disasters. In its fi rst major test, this reorganized system failed. Katrina revealed that much 

remains to be done. 

Th e Committee began this investigation of the preparations for and response to Hurricane 

Katrina within two weeks of the hurricane’s landfall on the Gulf Coast. Th e tragic loss of life 

and human suff ering in Katrina’s wake would have been suffi cient in themselves to compel 

the Committee’s attention. But the conspicuous failures in governments’ emergency preparedness and response added a sense of urgency to the investigation – not only because of 

Hurricane Katrina over the 

Gulf Coast, August 2005

NOAA photo

Executive Summary
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our heightened national awareness of the dangers of both terrorist acts and natural disasters, but because so much eff ort had been directed towards improvement. 

Th e Committee’s investigation has been bipartisan, and has examined in detail the actions 

of offi cials of local, state, and federal government departments and agencies. Th ough suffering was pervasive across the Gulf Coast, the Committee focused most of its eff orts on 

the response in New Orleans, where massive fl ooding presented extraordinary challenges 

to responders and victims alike. In addition, the investigation centered largely on the initial 

response to the hurricane in the critical week or so aft er the storm hit. We have conducted 

formal interviews of more than 325 witnesses, reviewed over 838,000 pages of documentation, and conducted 22 public hearings with 85 witnesses in the course of our information 

gathering eff orts. 

Most of the hearings focused on what went wrong in Katrina. Two of the hearings, however, 

examined the successes: the eff ective and heroic search-and-rescue eff orts by the U.S. Coast 

Guard; and the outstanding performance of certain members of the private sector in restoring essential services to the devastated communities and providing relief to the victims.

Th ese successes shared some important traits. Th e Coast Guard and certain private-sector 

businesses both conducted extensive planning and training for disasters, and they put that 

preparation into use when disaster struck. Both moved material assets and personnel out 

of harm’s way as the storm approached, but kept them close enough to the front lines for 

quick response aft er it passed. Perhaps most important, both had empowered front-line 

leaders who were able to make decisions when they needed to be made.

The Roles of the Different Levels of 

Government in Disaster Response

Assessing the government’s response to Katrina requires, at the outset, an understanding 

of the roles of government entities and their leaders and the framework within which they 

operate. Every level of government, and many components within each level, play important roles. At every level of government, the chief executive has the ultimate responsibility 

to manage an emergency response. 

It has long been standard practice that emergency response begins at the lowest possible 

jurisdictional level – typically the local government, with state government becoming 

involved at the local government’s request when the resources of local government are (or 

are expected to be) overwhelmed. Similarly, while the federal government provides ongoing 

fi nancial support to state and local governments for emergency preparedness, ordinarily it 

becomes involved in responding to a disaster at a state’s request when resources of state and 

local governments are (or are expected to be) overwhelmed. Louisiana’s Emergency Operations Plan explicitly lays out this hierarchy of response.

During a catastrophe, which by defi nition almost immediately exceeds state and local resources and signifi cantly disrupts governmental operations and emergency services, the role 

of the federal government is particularly vital, and it would reasonably be expected to play a 

more substantial role in response than it would in an “ordinary” disaster.

Long-Term and Short-Term Warnings Went Unheeded

Th e Committee has worked to identify and understand the sources of the government’s 

inadequate response and recovery eff orts. And while this Report does not purport to have 

 Hurricane Katrina: A Nation Still Uprepared
4

Executive Summary

identifi ed every such source, it is clear that there was no lack of information about the devastating potential of Katrina, or the uncertain strength of the levees and fl oodwalls protecting New Orleans, or the likely needs of survivors. Nonetheless, top offi cials at every level 

of government – despite strongly worded advisories from the National Hurricane Center 

(NHC) and personal warnings from NHC Director Max Mayfi eld – did not appear to truly 

grasp the magnitude of the storm’s potential for destruction before it made landfall. 

Th e potentially devastating threat of a catastrophic hurricane to the Gulf Coast has been 

known for 40 years: New Orleans experienced fl ooding in some areas of remarkably similar 

proportions from Hurricane Betsy in 1965, and Hurricane Camille devastated the Gulf 

Coast in 1969. More recently, numerous experts and governmental offi cials had been anticipating an increase in violent hurricanes, and New Orleans’ special and growing vulnerability to catastrophic fl ooding due to changing geological and other conditions was widely 

described in both technical and popular media. 

Hurricane Georges hit the Gulf Coast in 1998, spurring the State of Louisiana to ask Federal 

Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) for assistance with catastrophic hurricane planning. Little was accomplished for the next six years. Between 2000 and 2003, state authorities, an emergency-preparedness 

contractor, and FEMA’s own 

regional staff repeatedly advised 

FEMA headquarters in Washington that planning for evacuation 

and shelter for the “New Orleans 

scenario” was incomplete and 

inadequate, but FEMA failed to 

approach other federal agencies 

for help with transportation and 

shelter or to ensure that the city 

and state had the matters in hand.

Th en, in 2004, aft er a White 

House aide received a briefi ng on 

the catastrophic consequences 

of a Category 3 hurricane hitting 

New Orleans, the federal government sponsored a planning 

exercise, with participation from 

federal, state, and local offi cials, 

based on a scenario whose characteristics foreshadowed most of 

Katrina’s impacts. While this hypothetical “Hurricane Pam” exercise resulted in draft plans beginning in early 2005, they were 

incomplete when Katrina hit. Nonetheless, some offi cials took the initiative to use concepts 

developed in the draft s, with mixed success, in the critical aspects of the Katrina response. 

However, many of its admonitory lessons were either ignored or inadequately applied. 

During the Hurricane Pam exercise, offi cials determined that massive fl ooding from a catastrophic storm in New Orleans could threaten the lives of 60,000 people and trap hundreds 

of thousands more, while incapacitating local resources for weeks to months. Th e Pam 

exercise gave all levels of government a reminder that the “New Orleans scenario” required 

more forethought, preparation, and investment than a “typical” storm. Also, it reinforced 

Katrina’s track of disaster

Geography and Map Division, 

The Library of Congress
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the importance of coordination both within and among federal, state, and local governments for an eff ective response.

Th e specifi c danger that Katrina posed to the Gulf Coast became clear on the aft ernoon of 

Friday, August 26, when forecasters at NHC and the National Weather Service (NWS) saw 

that the storm was turning west. First in phone calls to Louisiana emergency-management 

offi cials and then in their 5 p.m. ET Katrina forecast and accompanying briefi ngs, they 

alerted both Louisiana and Mississippi that the track of the storm was now expected to shift 

signifi cantly to the west of its original track toward the Florida panhandle. NHC warned 

that Katrina could be a Category 4 or even a Category 5 by landfall. By the next morning, 

NWS offi cials directly confi rmed to the Governor of Louisiana and other state and local offi cials that New Orleans was squarely at risk. 

Over the weekend, there was a drumbeat of warnings: FEMA held video-teleconferences 

on both days, where the danger of Katrina and the particular risks to New Orleans were 

discussed; NHC’s Max Mayfi eld called the governors of the aff ected states, something he 

had only done once before in his 33-year career; President Bush took the unusual step of 

declaring, in advance, an emergency for the states in the impact zone; numerous media 

reports noted that New Orleans was a “bowl,” and could be left submerged by the storm; the 

Department of Homeland Security’s Simulation and Analysis group generated a report stating that the levees protecting New Orleans were at risk of breaching and overtopping; and 

internal FEMA slides stated that the projected impacts of Katrina could be worse than those 

in the Hurricane Pam exercise. Th e warnings were as widespread as they were dire.

Preparation Proved Insuffi cient 

Katrina was not a “typical” hurricane as it approached landfall; it was much larger, more 

powerful, and was capable of producing catastrophic damage. 

In some respects, offi cials did prepare for Katrina with the understanding that it could be a 

catastrophe. Some coastal towns in Mississippi went to extraordinary lengths to get citizens 

to evacuate, including sending people door-to-door to convince and cajole people to move 

out of harm’s way. Th e State of Louisiana activated more than twice the number of National 

Guard troops called to duty in any prior hurricane, and achieved the largest evacuation of 

a threatened population ever to occur. Th e City of New Orleans issued its fi rst ever mandatory evacuation order. Th e Coast Guard readied its personnel, pre-positioned its equipment, 

and stood by to begin search-and-rescue operations as quickly as humanly possible. Departing from usual practice, the governors of the three aff ected states requested, and President 

Bush issued, emergency declarations before the storm made landfall. 

But however vigorous these preparations, ineff ective leadership, poor advance planning, 

and an unwillingness to devote suffi cient resources to emergency management over the 

long term doomed them to fail when Katrina struck. Despite the understanding of the Gulf 

Coast’s particular vulnerability to hurricane devastation, offi cials braced for Katrina with 

full awareness of critical defi ciencies in their plans and gaping holes in their resources. 

While Katrina’s destructive force could not be denied, state and local offi cials did not marshal enough of the resources at their disposal. 

In addition, years of short-changing federal, state, and local emergency functions left them 

incapable of fully carrying out their missions to protect the public and care for victims. For 

example, the lack of survivable, interoperable communications, which Governor Haley 

Barbour of Mississippi said was the most critical problem in his state, occurred because of 

 Hurricane Katrina: A Nation Still Uprepared
6

Executive Summary

an accumulation of decisions by federal, state, and local offi cials that left this long-standing 

problem unsolved. 

Th e Committee believes that leadership failures needlessly compounded these losses. New 

Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin and Louisiana Governor Kathleen Blanco – who knew the limitations of their resources to address a catastrophe – did not specify those needs adequately 

to the federal government before landfall. For example, while Governor Blanco stated in a 

letter to President Bush, two days before landfall, that she anticipated the resources of the 

state would be overwhelmed, she made no specifi c request for assistance in evacuating the 

known tens of thousands of people without means of transportation, and a senior State 

offi cial identifi ed no unmet needs in response to a federal off er of assistance the following 

day. Th e State’s transportation secretary also ignored his responsibilities under the state’s 

emergency operations plan, leaving no arm of the State government prepared to obtain 

and deliver additional transportation to those in New Orleans who lacked it when Katrina 

struck. In view of the long-standing role of requests as a trigger for action by higher levels of 

government, the State bears responsibility for not signaling its needs to the federal government more clearly. 

Compounded by leadership failures of its own, the federal government bears responsibility 

for not preparing eff ectively for its role in the post-storm response.

FEMA was unprepared for a catastrophic event of the scale of Katrina. Well before Katrina, 

FEMA’s relationships with state and local offi cials, once a strength, had been eroded in part 

because certain preparedness grant programs were transferred elsewhere in the Department 

of Homeland Security (DHS). With its importance to state and local preparedness activities reduced, FEMA’s eff ectiveness was diminished. In addition, at no time in its history, 

including in the years before it became part of DHS, had FEMA developed – nor had it been 

designed to develop – response capabilities suffi cient for a catastrophe, nor had it developed 

the capacity to mobilize suffi cient resources from other federal agencies, and the private and 

nonprofi t sectors. 

Moreover, FEMA’s former Director, Michael Brown, lacked the leadership skills that were 

needed. Before landfall, Brown did not direct the adequate pre-positioning of critical personnel and equipment, and willfully failed to communicate with DHS Secretary, Michael 

Chertoff , to whom he was supposed to report. Earlier in the hurricane season, FEMA had 

pre-positioned an unprecedented amount of relief supplies in the region. But the supplies 

were not enough. Similarly, while both FEMA and the Department of Health and Human 

Services (HHS) made eff orts to activate the federal emergency health capabilities of the 

National Disaster Medical System (NDMS) and the U.S. Public Health Service (PHS), only a 

limited number of federal medical teams were actually in position prior to landfall to deploy 

into the aff ected area. Only one such team was in a position to provide immediate medical 

care in the aft ermath of the storm.

More broadly, DHS – as the Department charged with preparing for and responding to 

domestic incidents, whether terrorist attacks or natural disasters – failed to eff ectively lead 

the federal response to Hurricane Katrina. DHS leadership failed to bring a sense of urgency 

to the federal government’s preparation for Hurricane Katrina, and Secretary Chertoff 

himself should have been more engaged in preparations over the weekend before landfall. 

Secretary Chertoff made only top-level inquiries into the state of preparations, and accepted 

uncritically the reassurances he received. He did not appear to reach out to the other Cabinet secretaries to make sure that they were readying their departments to provide whatever 

assistance DHS – and the people of the Gulf Coast – might need. 
7

Similarly, had he invoked the Catastrophic Incident Annex of the National Response Plan 

(NRP-CIA), Secretary Chertoff could have helped remove uncertainty about the federal 

government’s need and authority to take initiative before landfall and signaled that all 

federal government agencies were expected to think – and act – proactively in preparing for 

and responding to Katrina. Th e Secretary’s activation of the NRP-CIA could have increased 

the urgency of the federal response and led the federal government to respond more proactively rather than waiting for formal requests from overwhelmed state and local offi cials. 

Because delay may preclude meaningful 

assistance and state and local resources may 

be quickly overwhelmed and incapacitated, 

the NRP-CIA directs federal agencies to preposition resources without awaiting requests 

from the state and local governments. Even 

then, except in certain prescribed circumstances, the NRP-CIA holds these resources 

at mobilization sites until requested by state 

and local offi cials. 

Th e military also had a role to play, and ultimately, the National Guard and active-duty 

military troops and assets deployed during 

Katrina constituted the largest domestic 

deployment of military forces since the Civil 

War. And while the Department of Defense 

(DOD) took additional steps to prepare for 

Katrina beyond those it had taken for prior 

civil-support missions, its preparations were 

not suffi cient for a storm of Katrina’s magnitude. Individual commanders took actions 

that later helped improve the response, but 

these actions were not coordinated by the 

Department. Th e Department’s preparations 

were consistent with how DOD interpreted 

its role under the NRP, which was to provide support in response to requests for assistance 

from FEMA. However, additional preparations in advance of specifi c requests for support 

could have enabled a more rapid response. 

In addition, the White House shares responsibility for the inadequate pre-landfall preparations. To be sure, President Bush, at the request of Brown, did take the initiative to personally call Governor Blanco to urge a mandatory evacuation. As noted earlier, he also took the 

unusual step of declaring an emergency in the Gulf Coast States prior to Katrina’s landfall. 

On the other hand, the President did not leave his Texas ranch to return to Washington 

until two days aft er landfall, and only then convened his Cabinet, as well as a White House 

task force, to oversee federal response eff orts.

Response at all Levels of 

Government Was Unacceptable

Th e eff ect of the long-term failures at every level of government to plan and prepare adequately for a catastrophic hurricane in the Gulf of Mexico was evident in the inadequate 

preparations before Katrina’s landfall and then again in the initial response to the storm.

Waiting for help, New Orleans

Photo © 2005 The Times-Picayune 

Publishing Co., all rights reserved. 

Used with permission of the TimesPicayune

 Hurricane Katrina: A Nation Still Uprepared
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Executive Summary

Search and Rescue

Flooding in New Orleans drove thousands of survivors to attics and rooft ops to await rescue. Some people were trapped in attics and nursing homes and drowned as the dirty waters 

rose around them. Others escaped only by chopping their way through roofs. Infrastructure 

damage complicated the organization and conduct of search-and-rescue missions in New 

Orleans and elsewhere. Destruction of communications towers and equipment, in particular, limited the ability of crews to communicate with one another, undermining coordination and effi ciency. Rescuers also had to contend with weapons fi re, debris, and polluted 

water. Th e skill and dedication of Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries (W&F) 

offi cials and others working in these adverse conditions stand out as a singular success story 

of the hurricane response.

Applying a model developed in the Hurricane Pam exercise, rescue teams in Louisiana 

brought hurricane victims to high ground, where they were supposed to receive food, water, 

medical attention, and transport to shelters. Here, too, there were problems. Poor communications delayed state and federal offi cials’ learning about where rescuees had been 

dropped, in turn slowing shipments of food and water to those areas. Th e City of New 

Orleans was unprepared to help people evacuate, as many buses from the city’s own fl eet 

were submerged, while offi cials had not arranged in advance for drivers for those buses that 

were available. 

Th e storm also laid waste to much of the city’s police, whose headquarters and several district offi ces, along with hundreds of vehicles, rounds of ammunition, and uniforms were all 

destroyed within the fi rst two days of landfall.

Planning for search and rescue was also insuffi cient. FEMA, for instance, failed to provide 

boats for its search-and-rescue teams even though fl ooding had been confi rmed by Tuesday. Moreover, interagency coordination was inadequate at both the state and federal levels. 

While the Louisiana W&F and FEMA are responsible for interagency search-and-rescue 

coordination at the state and federal levels, respectively, neither developed adequate plans 

for this mission. Staggeringly, the City of New Orleans Fire Department (NOFD) owned no 

boats, and the New Orleans Police Department (NOPD) owned fi ve. Meanwhile, widespread communications failures in Louisiana and Mississippi were so bad that many offi cers 

reverted to either physically running messages from one person to another, or passing messages along a daisy chain of offi cers using radios with limited range.

Situational Awareness

While authorities recognized the need to begin search-and-rescue missions even before the 

hurricane winds fully subsided, other aspects of the response were hindered by a failure to 

quickly recognize the dimensions of the disaster. Th ese problems were particularly acute 

at the federal level. Th e Homeland Security Operations Center (HSOC) – charged with 

providing reliable information to decision makers including the Secretary of DHS and the 

President – failed to create a system to identify and acquire all available, relevant information, and as a result situational awareness was deeply fl awed.

With local and state resources immediately overwhelmed, rapid federal mobilization of 

resources was critical. Yet reliable information on such vital developments as the levee 

failures, the extent of fl ooding, and the presence of thousands of people in need of life-sustaining assistance at the New Orleans Convention Center did not reach the White House, 

Secretary Chertoff , or other key offi cials for hours, and in some cases more than a day. 

Brown, then in Louisiana, contributed to the problem by refusing to communicate with 

Secretary Chertoff , opting instead to pass information directly to White House staff . Moreover, even though senior DHS offi cials did receive, on the day of landfall, numerous reports 
9

that should have led to an understanding of the increasingly dire situation in New Orleans, 

many indicated they were not aware of the crisis until sometime Tuesday morning.

DHS was slow to recognize the scope of the disaster or that FEMA had become overwhelmed. On the day aft er landfall, DHS offi cials were still struggling to determine the 

“ground truth” about the extent of the fl ooding despite the many reports they had received 

about the catastrophe; key offi cials did not grasp the need to act on the less-than-complete 

information that is to be expected in a disaster. DHS leaders did not become fully engaged 

in recovery eff orts until Th ursday, when in Deputy Secretary Michael Jackson’s words, they 

“tried to kick it up a notch”; aft er that, they did provide signifi cant leadership within DHS 

(and FEMA) as well as coordination across the federal government. But this eff ort should 

have begun sooner.

DOD also was slow to acquire information regarding the extent of the storm’s devastation. 

DOD offi cials relied primarily on media reports for their information. Many senior DOD 

offi cials did not learn that the levees had breached until Tuesday; some did not learn until 

Wednesday. As DOD waited for DHS to provide information about the scope of the damage, 

it also waited for the lead federal agency, FEMA, to identify the support needed from DOD. 

Th e lack of situational awareness during this phase appears to have been a major reason for 

DOD’s belated adoption of the forward-looking posture necessary in a catastrophic incident.

Post-Storm Evacuation

Overwhelmed by Katrina, the city and state turned to FEMA for help. On Monday, Governor Blanco asked Brown for buses, and Brown assured the state the same day that 500 

buses were en route to assist in the evacuation of New Orleans and would arrive within 

hours. In spite of Brown’s assurances and the state’s continued requests over the course 

of the next two days, FEMA did not direct the U.S. Department of Transportation to send 

buses until very early on Wednesday, two days aft er landfall. Th e buses did not begin to 

arrive until Wednesday evening, and not in signifi cant numbers until Th ursday. Concerned 

over FEMA’s delay in providing buses – and handicapped by the Louisiana Department of 

Transportation and Development’s utter failure to make any preparation to carry out its 

lead role for evacuation under the state’s emergency plan – Governor Blanco directed members of her offi ce to begin locating buses on Tuesday and approved an eff ort to commandeer 

school buses for evacuation on Wednesday. But these eff orts were too little, too late. Tens of 

thousands of people were forced to wait in unspeakably horrible conditions until as late as 

Saturday to be evacuated. 

Logistics and Military Support

Problems with obtaining, communicating, and managing information plagued many other 

aspects of the response as well. FEMA lacked the tools to track the status of shipments, 

interfering with the management of supplying food, water, ice, and other vital commodities to those in need across the Gulf Coast. So, too, did the incompatibility of the electronic 

systems used by federal and state authorities to manage requests for assistance, which made 

it necessary to transfer requests from the state system to the federal system manually.

Supplies of commodities were especially problematic. Federal shipments to Mississippi did 

not reach adequate levels until 10 days aft er landfall. Th e reasons for this are unclear, but 

FEMA’s inadequate “surge capacity” – the ability to quickly ramp up the volume of shipments – is a likely cause. In both Mississippi and Louisiana, there were additional problems 

in getting the supplies the “last mile” to individuals in need. Both states planned to make 

supplies available for pickup at designated distribution points, but neither anticipated the 

problems people would face in reaching those points, due to impassable roads or other issues. And in Louisiana, the National Guard was not equipped to assume this task. One of 

Hurricane Katrina: A Nation Still Uprepared 
10

Louisiana’s greatest shortages was portable toilets, which were requested for the Superdome 

but never arrived there, as more than 20,000 people were forced to stay in the Superdome 

without working plumbing for nearly a week.

For their part, Louisiana and Mississippi relied heavily on support from other states to 

supplement their own emergency resources. Both states were parties to an interstate agreement known as the Emergency Management Assistance Compact (EMAC), which provides 

a system for sharing National Guard troops and other resources in natural disasters. As in 

many other areas of the Katrina response, however, the magnitude of the demands strained 

the EMAC process and revealed limitations in the system. Paperwork burdens proved overwhelming. Louisiana experienced diffi culties processing the volume of incoming resources. 

On Wednesday, August 31, the federal National Guard Bureau, which ordinarily serves 

a coordinating function within DOD, relieved Louisiana and Mississippi of many of the 

bureaucratic responsibilities by making direct requests for available troops to state adjutants 

general.

Th is process quickly resulted in the largest National Guard deployment in U.S. history, with 

50,000 troops and supporting equipment arriving from 49 states and four territories within 

two weeks. Th ese forces participated in every aspect of emergency response, from medical 

care to law enforcement and debris removal, and were considered invaluable by Louisiana 

and Mississippi offi cials.

Although this process successfully deployed a large number of National Guard troops, it did 

not proceed effi ciently, or according to any pre-existing plan or process. Th ere is, in fact, no 

established process for the large-scale, nation-wide deployment of National Guard troops 

for civil support. In addition, the deployments of National Guard troops were not coordinated with the federal Northern Command, which was overseeing the large-scale deployments and operations of the active-duty military (i.e., Regular and activated Reserve forces). 

While the NRP has specifi c procedures for active-duty involvement in natural disasters, the 

deployment of these troops raised unforeseen issues and was initially a source of frustration 

to Governor Blanco. Th e Governor directed her adjutant general to secure additional troops 

on the day aft er landfall, but federal and state offi cials did not coordinate her requests well, 

and ground troops didn’t arrive in signifi cant numbers for several days. DOD chose to rely 

primarily on the deployment of National Guard troops (versus federal active-duty troops) 

pursuant to its declared strategy and because it believed they were best suited to the required tasks, including performing law enforcement. In addition, the need to resolve command issues between National Guard and active-duty forces – an issue taken up (but not 

resolved) in a face-to-face meeting between President Bush and the Governor on Air Force 

One on the Friday aft er landfall – may have played a role in the timing of active-duty troop 

deployments. Th e issue became moot as the two forces stayed under their separate commands, an arrangement that turned out to work well in this case, thanks to the cooperation 

of the respective commanders.

While the large numbers of active-duty troops did not arrive until the end of the fi rst week 

following landfall, National Guard troops did, and DOD contributed in other important 

ways during that period. Early in the week, DOD ordered its military commanders to 

push available assets to the Gulf Coast. Th ey also streamlined their ordinarily bureaucratic 

processes for handling FEMA requests for assistance and emphasized movement based on 

vocal commands with the paperwork to follow, though some FEMA offi cials believe that 

DOD’s approval process continued to take too long. Th ey provided signifi cant support to 

search-and-rescue missions, evacuee airlift s, logistics management of buses arriving in the 

state for evacuation, and other matters. 

Executive Summary
11

Toward the end of the week, with its own resources stretched thin, FEMA turned to DOD 

to take over logistics for all commodity movements. DOD acceded to the request, and 

provided some logistics assistance to FEMA. However, it did not undertake the complete 

logistical take-over initially requested by FEMA because that was not needed. 

By Tuesday aft ernoon, the New Orleans Superdome had become overcrowded, leading 

offi cials to turn additional refugees away. Mayor Nagin then decided to open the Morial 

Convention Center as a second refuge of last resort inside the city, but did not supply it with 

food or water. Moreover, he communicated his decision to open the Convention Center to 

state and federal offi cials poorly, if at all. Th at failure, in addition to the delay of shipments 

due to security concerns and DHS’s own independent lack of awareness of the situation, 

contributed to the paucity of food, water, security, and medical care at the Convention 

Center, as a population of approximately 19,000 gathered there. Th ose vital commodities 

and services did not arrive until Friday, when the Louisiana National Guard, assisted by 

National Guard units from fi ve other states, brought in relief supplies provided by FEMA, 

established law and order, and then evacuated the Convention Center on Saturday within 

eight hours. 

Law Enforcement

Law enforcement outside the Superdome and the Convention Center was a problem, and 

was fueled by several contributing factors, including erroneous statements by top city offi cials that infl amed the public’s perception of lawlessness in New Orleans. 

Without eff ective law enforcement, real or imagined safety threats interrupted virtually 

every aspect of the response. Fearing for their personal safety, medical and search-and-rescue teams withdrew from their missions. FEMA and commercial vendors of critical supplies oft en refused to make deliveries until military escorts could be arranged. In fact, there 

was some lawlessness, yet for every actual act there were rumors of dozens more, leading 

to widespread and inaccurate reporting that severely complicated a desperate situation. 

Unfortunately, local, state, and federal offi cials did little to stanch this rumor fl ow. Police 

presence on the streets was inadequate, in part because in a matter of hours Katrina turned 

the NOPD from protectors of the public to victims of the storm. Nonetheless, most New 

Orleans police offi cers appear to have reported for duty, many setting aside fears about the 

safety of their families or the status of their homes. 

Even so, the ability of the offi cers who remained to perform their duties was signifi cantly 

hampered by the lack of basic supplies. While supplies such as weapons and ammunition 

were lost to fl ooding, the NOPD leadership did not provide its offi cers with basic necessities 

such as food; nor did the department have logistics in place to handle supplies. Members of 

the NOPD also identifi ed the lack of a unifi ed command for this incident as a major problem; eight members of the command staff were extremely critical of the lack of leadership 

from the City’s Offi ce of Emergency Preparedness (OEP). Th e department’s rank and fi le 

were unfamiliar with both the department’s and the city’s emergency-operations manuals 

and other hurricane emergency procedures. Defi ciencies in the NOPD’s manual, lack of 

training on this manual, lack of familiarity with it, or a combination of the three resulted in 

inadequate protection of department resources.

Federal law-enforcement assistance was too slow in coming, in large part because the two 

federal departments charged under the NRP with providing such assistance – DHS and the 

Department of Justice (DOJ) – had done almost no pre-storm planning. In fact, they failed 

to determine even well into the post-landfall period which of the two departments would 

assume the lead for federal law enforcement under the NRP. As a result, later in the week, as 

federal law-enforcement offi cers did arrive, some were distracted by a pointless “turf war” 

Hurricane Katrina: A Nation Still Uprepared 
12

Executive Summary

between DHS and DOJ over which agency was in the lead. In the end, federal assistance was 

crucial, but should have arrived much sooner.

Health Care

Safety concerns were only one of numerous challenges faced by health-care providers. Th ere 

were numerous other challenges, including the following:

• Medical teams had to triage more than 70,000 rescuees and evacuees and 

provide acute care to the sick and wounded. While offi cials used plans developed in the Hurricane Pam exercise as a helpful framework for managing this 

process, existing emergency-room facilities were overwhelmed by the volume 

of patients. Local and state offi cials quickly set up temporary fi eld hospitals at a 

sports arena and a K-Mart in Baton Rouge to supplement hospital capacity.

• New Orleans had a large population of “special-needs patients,” individuals 

living at home who required ongoing medical assistance. Before Katrina struck, 

the City Health Department activated a plan to establish a care facility for this 

population within the Superdome and provided transportation to evacuate 

several hundred patients and their caregivers to Baton Rouge. While Superdome facilities proved useful in treating special-needs patients who remained 

behind, they had to contend with shortages of supplies, physical damage to 

the facility necessitating a post-landfall relocation of patients and equipment 

to an area adjacent to the Superdome, and a population of more than 20,000 

people using the Superdome as a refuge of last resort. Also, FEMA’s Disaster 

Medical Assistance Teams (DMATs) which provide the invaluable resources 

of pharmacies and hospital equipment, arrived at the Superdome on the night 

following landfall, but left temporarily on Th ursday, before the evacuation of 

the Superdome’s special-needs population was completed, because of security 

concerns.

• In Louisiana, hospitals had to evacuate aft er landfall on short notice, principally due to loss of electrical power. While hospitals had evacuated some of 

their patients before landfall, they had retained others thought to be too frail 

for transport, and believed that by staying open they would be available to 

serve hurricane victims. Th eir strategy became untenable aft er landfall when 

power was lost, and their backup generators were rendered inoperable by 

fl ooding and fuel shortages. Th e Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals (DHH) stepped in to arrange for their evacuation; while successful, it had 

to compete with search-and-rescue teams for helicopters and other needed 

resources. 

• Many nursing homes in and around New Orleans lacked adequate evacuation plans. Although they were required to have plans on fi le with local government, there was no process to ensure that there were suffi cient resources to 

evacuate all the nursing homes at once, and dozens of patients who were not 

evacuated died. When evacuation became necessary, some sent their patients 

to the Superdome, where offi cials, struggling to handle the volume of patients 

already there, were obliged to accept still more. 

Long-Term Factors Contributed to the Poor Response

Actions taken – and failures to act – well before Katrina struck compounded the problems 

resulting from the ineff ective leadership that characterized the immediate preparations for 
13

the hurricane and the post-landfall response. A common theme of these earlier actions is 

underfunding emergency preparedness. While the Committee did not examine the confl icting political or budget priorities that may have played a role, in many cases the shortsightedness associated with the underfunding is glaring. Among notable examples are the 

following:

• Th e Louisiana Offi ce of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness 

(LOHSEP), the state counterpart to FEMA, suff ered chronic staffi ng problems 

and employee turnover due to underfunding. LOHSEP’s planning chief also 

testifi ed that lack of resources prevented the agency from meeting its schedule 

for periodic review and updates of state emergency plans.

• Th e Offi ce of Emergency Preparedness for New Orleans, a city long known to 

be among the nation’s most vulnerable to a catastrophic hurricane, had a staff 

of only three. Its police and fi re departments, responsible for search-and-rescue activities, had fi ve boats and no boats, respectively. In 2004, the city turned 

down a request by the NOFD to fund the purchase of six additional boats.

• Th e Hurricane Pam exercise faced repeated delays due to funding constraints. 

It took nearly fi ve years for the federal government to approve the state’s initial 

funding request, and the limited funding fi nally granted necessitated last-minute cutbacks in the scope of the exercise. Follow-up workshops were delayed by 

funding shortfalls – some as small as the $15,000 needed for participants’ travel 

expenses – that either the state or federal government should have remedied. 

• Numerous witnesses testifi ed that FEMA’s budget was far short of what was 

needed to accomplish its mission, and that this contributed to FEMA’s failure 

to be prepared for a catastrophe. FEMA witnesses also universally pointed out 

that the agency has suff ered for the last few years from a vacancy rate of 15 to 

20 percent (i.e., between 375 to 500 vacant positions in a 2,500-person agency), 

including several at key supervisory levels. FEMA sought additional funding 

but did not receive it. Th e Committee found that FEMA’s budget shortages 

hindered its preparedness.

Th e Committee also found that inadequate training in the details of the recently promulgated NRP was a contributing factor in shortcomings in the government’s performance. 

Louisiana emergency-management offi cials and National Guardsmen were receiving basic 

NRP and Incident Command System (ICS) training two days aft er the storm hit. Certain 

FEMA offi cials, also, were inadequately trained on the NRP and ICS. Only one large-scale 

federal exercise of the NRP took place before Katrina, the DHS’s Top Offi cials 3 (TOPOFF 

3) exercise in April 2005, approximately three months aft er the NRP was issued. TOPOFF 

3, sponsored by DHS, involved responders from all levels of government. A November 2005 

report by the DHS Inspector General, echoing the fi ndings of an earlier report by DHS itself 

in May 2005, found that the exercise, which involved federal, state and local responders, 

“highlighted – at all levels of government – a fundamental lack of understanding for the 

principles and protocols set forth in the NRP and [National Incident Management System].” Th e lack of familiarity with emergency-management principles and plans hampered 

the Katrina response.

Th e Committee also identifi ed signifi cant planning failures that predated Katrina. One 

of the most remarkable stories from this investigation is the history of planning for the 

100,000 people in New Orleans believed to lack the means to evacuate themselves. Local 

and state offi cials have known since at least 1994 about the need to address this problem. 

For its part, the federal government, which knew about this problem for some time, neither 

Hurricane Katrina: A Nation Still Uprepared 
14

Executive Summary

monitored their planning nor off ered assistance. Th is evacuation problem was not included 

in the Hurricane Pam exercise and, during follow-up meetings in the summer of 2005, 

New Orleans offi cials informed counterparts from FEMA, other federal agencies, and the 

state preparedness agency that the city was not able to provide for the necessary pre-storm 

evacuation, but nothing was done to resolve the issue. 

• Th e City of New Orleans, with primary responsibility for evacuation of its 

citizens, had language in its plan stating the city’s intent to assist those who 

needed transportation for pre-storm evacuation, but had no actual plan provisions to implement that intent. In late 2004 and 2005, city offi cials negotiated 

contracts with Amtrak, riverboat owners, and others to pre-arrange transportation alternatives, but received inadequate 

support from the City’s Director of Homeland 

Security and Emergency Preparedness, and 

contracts were not in place when Katrina 

struck. As Katrina approached, notwithstanding the city’s evacuation plans on paper, the 

best solution New Orleans had for people 

without transportation was a private-citizen 

volunteer carpool initiative called Operation 

Brothers’ Keepers and transit buses taking 

people – not out of the city, but to the Superdome. While the Superdome provided shelter 

from the devastating winds and water, conditions there deteriorated quickly. Katrina’s 

“near miss” ripped the covering off the roof, 

caused leaking, and knocked out the power, 

rendering the plumbing, air conditioning, and 

public announcement system totally useless. 

• Th e Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development 

(DOTD), whose Secretary had personally accepted departmental responsibility 

under the state’s emergency operations plan to arrange for transportation 

for evacuation in emergencies, had done nothing to prepare for that responsibility prior to Katrina. While the Secretary attempted to defend his inaction 

in a personal appearance before the Committee, the Committee found his explanations rang hollow, and his account of uncommunicated doubts and objections to state policy disturbing. Had his Department identifi ed available buses 

or other means of transport for evacuation within the state in the months before 

the hurricane, at a minimum the state would have been prepared to evacuate 

people stranded in New Orleans aft er landfall more quickly than it did. 

• FEMA and the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT), charged under the 

NRP with supporting state and local government transportation needs (including evacuation) in emergencies, did little to plan for the possibility that they 

would be called on to assist with post-landfall evacuation needs, despite being 

on notice for over a month before Katrina hit that the state and local governments needed more buses and drivers – and being on notice for years that tens 

of thousands of people would have no means to evacuate. 

Trapped by floodwaters, 

New Orleans

AP/Wide World Photo
15

• Th ough much attention had been paid to addressing communications shortfalls, eff orts to address 

interoperability – as well as simply operability – were 

inadequate. Th ere was little advance preparation for 

responders operating in an area with no power and 

where virtually all forms of pre-existing communications were destroyed. And while satellite phones were 

available to some, either they did not function properly 

or offi cials were not trained to use these relatively complex devices. Moreover, the National Communications 

System, the DHS agency primarily responsible under 

the NRP for providing communications support to fi rst 

responders during disasters, had no plans to do so.

Th ese planning failures would have been of far less consequence had the system of levees built to protect New Orleans 

from fl ooding stayed intact, as they had in most prior hurricanes. But they did not, and the resulting inundation was 

catastrophic. Th e levee failures themselves turned out to have 

roots long predating Katrina as well. While several engineering analyses continue, the Committee found deeply disturbing 

evidence of fl aws in the design and construction of the levees. 

For instance, two major drainage canals – the 17th Street and 

London Avenue Canals – failed at their foundations, prior to 

their fl ood walls being met with the water heights for which 

they were designed to protect central New Orleans.

Moreover, the greater metropolitan New Orleans area was 

literally riddled with levee breaches caused by massive overtopping and scouring of levees that were not “armored,” or properly designed, to guard against the cascading waters that would 

inevitably accompany a storm of the magnitude of Hurricane 

Katrina. Th e Committee also discovered that the inspectionand-maintenance regime in place to ensure that the levees, 

fl oodwalls, and other structures built to protect the residents 

of the greater New Orleans area was in no way commensurate 

with the risk posed to these persons and their property.

Equally troubling was the revelation of serious disagreement 

– still unresolved months aft er Katrina – among offi cials of several government entities over who had responsibility, and when, for key levee issues including 

emergency response and levee repair. Such confl icts prevented any meaningful emergency 

plans from being put in place and, at the time of Katrina, none of the relevant government 

agencies had a plan for responding to a levee breach. While the deadly waters continued to 

pour into the heart of the city aft er the hurricane had passed, the very government agencies 

that were supposed to work together to protect the city from such a catastrophe not only initially disagreed about whose responsibility it was to repair the levee breaches, but disagreed as 

to how the repairs should be conducted. Sadly, due to the lack of foresight and overall coordination prior to the storm, such confl icts existed as the waters of Lake Pontchartrain continued 

to fi ll central New Orleans.

Taking refuge on an Interstate 

island, Louisiana

FEMA

Hurricane Katrina: A Nation Still Uprepared 
16

Executive Summary

Waste, Fraud, and Abuse

Besides overwhelming many government emergency-response capabilities, Katrina severely 

aff ected the government’s ability to properly track and verify its costs when it contracted for 

disaster relief goods and services. While the Committee did not specifi cally include this issue in its investigation, the Committee became aware of wasteful, and sometimes fraudulent 

and abusive spending practices, and held two hearings on the subject.

It takes money to prepare, respond, and recover from a disaster, and typically the bigger the 

disaster, the more money it takes. As of March 8, 2006, the federal government had committed $88 billion to the response, recovery, and rebuilding eff orts. Unfortunately, not all 

of this money has been wisely spent. Precious taxpayer dollars have been lost due to waste, 

fraud, and abuse.

Among the problems that have come to the Committee’s attention are FEMA’s lack of 

fi nancial controls, failures to ensure eligibility of individuals receiving disaster-related assistance, and poor contracting practices, including the use of no-bid contracts. A notable 

example of the resulting wastefulness was FEMA’s purchase of 25,000 manufactured homes 

that are virtually useless because FEMA’s own regulations prohibit their installation in a 

fl ood plain. In a similar vein, FEMA’s lack of controls in dealing with hotels providing temporary housing for evacuees resulted in instances where hotels charged for empty rooms; 

individuals held multiple rooms; hotel rooms were used as storage units for personal goods; 

individuals stayed at resorts; and hotels charged rates as high as $400 per night.

Recommendations: A New National 

Emergency-Management System for the 21ST Century 

Th e Committee’s Report sets out seven core recommendations together with a series of supporting tactical recommendations, all designed to make the nation’s emergency-preparedness and response system strong, agile, eff ective, and robust. 

Hurricane Katrina exposed fl aws in the structure of FEMA and DHS that are too substantial 

to mend. Our fi rst core recommendation is to abolish FEMA and replace it with a stronger, more capable structure, to be known as the National Preparedness and Response Authority (NPRA). To take full advantage of the substantial range of resources DHS has at its 

disposal, NPRA will remain within DHS. Its Director would be assured of having suffi cient 

access and clout by having the rank of Deputy Secretary, and having a direct line of communication to the President during catastrophes. Th e Director would also serve as the Advisor 

to the President for national emergency management, in a manner akin to the Chairman of 

the Joint Chiefs of Staff . To ensure capable and qualifi ed leadership, senior NPRA offi cials 

would be selected from the ranks of professionals with experience in crisis management, 

in addition to substantial management and leadership experience, whether in the public, 

private, or non-profi t sector.

Our second core recommendation is to endow the new organization with the full range of 

responsibilities that are core to preparing for and responding to disasters. Th ese include 

the four central functions of comprehensive emergency management – mitigation, preparedness, response, and recovery – which need to be integrated. In addition, NPRA would 

adopt an “all-hazards plus” strategy for preparedness. In preparing our nation to respond to 

terrorist attacks and natural disasters, NPRA must focus on building those common capabilities – for example survivable, interoperable communications and evacuation plans – that 

are necessary regardless of the incident. At the same time, it must not neglect to build those 

unique capabilities – like mass decontamination in the case of a radiological attack or water 
17

search and rescue in the case of fl ooding – that will be needed for particular types of incidents. NPRA’s mandate should also include overseeing protection of critical infrastructure, 

such as energy facilities and telecommunications systems, both to protect such infrastructure from harm and to ensure that such infrastructure is restored as quickly as possible aft er 

a natural disaster or terrorist attack.

Our third core recommendation is to enhance regional operations to provide better coordination between federal agencies and the states and establish regional strike teams. Regional 

offi ces should be adequately staff ed, with representation from federal agencies outside DHS 

that are likely to be called on to respond to a signifi cant disaster in the region. Th ey should 

provide coordination and assist in planning, training, and exercising of emergency-preparedness and response activities; work with states to ensure that grant funds are spent most effectively; coordinate and develop inter-state agreements; enhance coordination with non-governmental organizations and the private sector; and provide personnel and assets, in the form 

of Strike Teams, to be the federal government’s fi rst line of response to a disaster. 

Th e Strike Teams would consist of, at a minimum, a designated Federal Coordinating Offi cer (FCO); personnel trained in incident management, public aff airs, relief and recovery, 

and communications support; a Defense Coordinating Offi cer (DCO); and liaisons to other 

federal agencies. Th ese regional Strike Teams should coordinate their training and exercises with the state and local offi cials and the private sector entities they will support when 

disasters occur.

Our fourth core recommendation is to build a true, government-wide operations center 

to provide enhanced situational awareness and manage interagency coordination in a 

disaster. Currently, there is a multiplicity of interagency coordinating structures, with overlapping missions, that attempt to facilitate an integrated federal response. Th ree of these 

structures – the Homeland Security Operations Center (HSOC), the National Response 

Coordination Center (NRCC), and the Interagency Incident Management Group (IIMG) 

– should be consolidated into a single, integrated entity – a new National Operations Center 

(NOC). Th e NOC would include representatives of all relevant federal agencies, and should 

provide for one clearly defi ned, emergency-management line of communication from the 

states to the federal government, and from the federal government to the states. It would 

also include a strong analytic team capable of sorting through and assessing information 

and determining which pieces would become part of the common operating picture.

To improve its performance in future disasters, the NOC should establish clear protocols 

and procedures to ensure that reports are received and reviewed at appropriate levels and in 

a timely manner. When there is notice of a potential major disaster, the NOC should implement plans, including one for obtaining information from DOD, for obtaining post-disaster 

situational awareness, including identifying sources of information and data particular to 

the region in which the disaster may occur and, where appropriate, bringing in individuals 

with particular knowledge or expertise about that region.

Our fi ft h core recommendation is to renew and sustain commitments at all levels of government to the nation’s emergency core management system. FEMA emergency-response 

teams have been reduced substantially in size, are inadequately equipped, and training for 

these teams has been all but eliminated. If the federal government is to improve its performance and be prepared to respond eff ectively to the next disaster, we must give NPRA 

– and the other federal agencies with central responsibilities under the NRP – the necessary 

resources to accomplish this. We must fund NPRA commensurate with the signifi cance of 

its mission and ensure that those funds are well spent. To be full partners in the national 

preparedness eff ort, states, and localities will need additional resources as well. 

Hurricane Katrina: A Nation Still Uprepared 
18

Executive Summary

Th e Administration and DHS must also ensure that federal leaders of all agencies with 

an emergency-support role understand their key responsibilities under the NRP and the 

resources they need to eff ectively carry out the comprehensive planning required, while also 

training and exercising on NIMS, NRP, and other operational plans. To fully integrate state 

and local offi cials into the system, there should be established an advisory council to NPRA 

made up of state and local offi cials and fi rst responders. Th e advisory council should play 

an integral role in ensuring that the full range of activities of the new organization – including developing response plans, conducting training and exercises, formulating preparedness 

goals, eff ectively managing grants and other resources – are done in full consultation and 

coordination with, and take into account the needs and priorities of, states and localities.

DHS and the NPRA should more fully integrate the private and nonprofi t sectors into their 

planning and preparedness initiatives. Among other things, they should designate specifi c 

individuals at the national and regional levels to work directly with private-sector organizations. Where appropriate, private-sector representatives should also be included in planning, training, and exercises. 

Our sixth core recommendation is to strengthen the underpinning of the nation’s response to disasters and catastrophes. Despite their shortcomings and imperfections, the 

NRP and National Incident Management System (NIMS), including the Emergency Support Function (ESF) structure currently represent the best approach available to respond to 

multi-agency, multi-jurisdictional emergencies. Federal, state, and local offi cials and other 

responders must commit to supporting the NRP and NIMS and working together to improve the performance of the national emergency management system. We must undertake 

further refi nements of the NRP and NIMS, develop operational plans, and engage in training and exercises to ensure that everyone involved in disaster response understands them 

and is prepared to carry them out. In particular, the NRP should be strengthened to make 

the unity of eff ort concept very clear, so that everyone understands the concept and their 

roles in establishing unity, and there should be clarifi cation of the importance of integrating 

agencies with ESF responsibilities into the ICS, rather than their operating in “stovepipes.”

Th e roles and responsibilities of the Principal Federal Offi cial (PFO) and FCO overlap, and 

were a source of confusion during Hurricane Katrina. Th e Staff ord Act should be amended 

to clarify the roles and responsibilities of the FCO, and the NRP should be revised to 

eliminate the PFO position for Staff ord Act-declared emergencies and disasters. It should 

also be amended to ensure that the Act addresses response to all disasters and catastrophes, 

whether natural or man-made.

Our seventh core recommendation is to improve the nation’s capacity to respond to catastrophic events. DHS should ensure that the Catastrophic Incident Annex (CIA) is fully 

understood by the federal departments and agencies with responsibilities associated with it. 

Th e Catastrophic Incident Supplement (CIS) should be completed and published, and the 

supporting operational plans for departments and agencies with responsibilities under the CIA 

should be completed. Th ese plans should be reviewed and coordinated with the states, and on a 

regional basis, to ensure they are understood, trained and exercised prior to an emergency.

DHS must also develop the national capabilities – especially surge capacity – it needs to 

respond to catastrophic disasters, ensuring it has suffi cient full-time staff , response teams, 

contracting personnel, and adequately trained and suffi ciently staff ed reserve corps to ramp 

up capabilities, as needed. Th ese capabilities must be scalable so that NPRA can draw on the 

appropriate resources from supporting ESF agencies to respond to a disaster irrespective of 

cause, size, or complexity. 
19

Conclusion

Th e Committee’s Report can do justice neither to the human suff ering endured during 

and aft er Katrina nor to the dimensions of the response. As to the latter, we have identifi ed 

many successes and many failures; no doubt there are others in both categories we have 

missed. Th e Committee shares the view expressed by President Bush shortly aft er Katrina 

that our nation can do better.

Avoiding past mistakes will not suffi ce. Our leadership and systems must be prepared for 

catastrophes we know will be unlike Katrina, whether due to natural causes or terrorism. Th e 

Committee hopes to help meet that goal through the recommendations in this Report, because almost exactly four years aft er 9/11, Katrina showed that the nation is still unprepared.

Ruins of apartment building, 

Long Beach, MS 

Denton Herring photo

Hurricane Katrina: A Nation Still Uprepared