By August 26, the possibility of never-before-happened destruction and damage was already being considered. Some computer models were putting the city of New Orleans right in the center of their track probabilities, and the chances of a direct hit were forecast at 17% (with strike probability rising to 29% by August 28). This scenario was considered a potential disaster because 80% of the New Orleans metropolitan area is below sea level along Lake Pontchartrain. Since the storm surge produced by the hurricane's right-front quadrant (containing the strongest winds) was more than 20 ft (6 m) near Biloxi, emergency management officials in New Orleans feared that the storm surge could go over the tops of levees protecting the city, causing major flooding. This risk of devastation had been known for some time; previous studies by FEMA and the Army Corps of Engineers had warned that a direct hurricane strike on New Orleans could lead to massive flooding, which would lead to thousands of drowning deaths, as well as many more suffering from disease and dehydration, as the flood waters slowly retreated from the city.
At a news conference 10:00 AM on August 28, shortly after Katrina was upgraded to a Category 5 storm, New Orleans mayor Ray Nagin ordered the first ever mandatory evacuation of the city, calling Katrina, "a storm that most of us have long feared". To speed up the evacuations, authorities used contraflow lane reversal on Interstate 10 leading west of New Orleans, as well as on Interstate 55 and Interstate 59 leading north from the city. The city government also established several "refuges of last resort" for citizens who could not leave the city, including the massive Louisiana Superdome, which housed approximately 26,000 people with food and water for several days as the storm came ashore. The Louisiana National Guard delivered three truckloads of water and seven truckloads of MRE's to the Superdome, enough to supply 15,000 people for three days.
Louisiana's hurricane evacuation plan calls for local governments in areas along and near the coast to call for evacuations in three phases, starting with the immediate coast 50 hours before the start of tropical storm force winds. Persons in areas designated Phase II begin evacuating 40 hours before the onset of tropical storm winds and those in Phase III areas (including New Orleans) evacuate 30 hours before the start of such winds.
However, many parishes were not able to provide sufficient transportation for citizens who did not have private means of evacuation, and many private care-taking facilities who relied on the same bus companies and ambulance services for evacuation were unable to evacuate their charges. Fuel and rental cars were in short supply and many forms of public transportation had been shut down well before the storm arrived. The end result was that hundreds of thousands of residents and tourists were unable to evacuate and remained in the city. Nonetheless, some estimates claimed that 90-92% of the 1.3 million residents of the New Orleans metropolitan region evacuated including 80% of Orleans parish.
Waterford Nuclear Generating Station
The Waterford Steam Electric Station, Unit 3, also known as Waterford 3, is a nuclear power station located on a 3,000-acre (12-km²) up-river from Hahnville, Louisiana, in St. Charles Parish.
Passenger car
A passenger car (North America) is a type of railway rolling stock that is designed to carry passengers. In British English it may be called a coach or carriage.
McComb, Mississippi
McComb is a city in Pike County, Mississippi, about 80 miles south of Jackson, just off of Interstate 55. As of the 2000 census, 13,337 people lived there, about a thousand more than in the 1980 census (12,331). It is the principal city of the McComb, Mississippi Micropolitan Statistical Area. McComb was founded in 1872 after Henry Simpson McComb of the New Orleans, Jackson and Great Northern Railroad (which would become the Illinois Central Railroad and now a part of the Canadian National Railway), decided to move the railroad's maintenance shops away from New Orleans, Louisiana, to avoid the New Orleans' saloons.
Singer Britney Spears was born in McComb.
Checkpoint Charlie
Checkpoint Charlie was one of three places where people could travel from the Western occupied sectors of Germany and Berlin to the Soviet occupied sectors.
These places were called checkpoints because they were places where passports and identities were checked.
As it was the only crossing point there were sometimes queues of people waiting to cross. But military traffic was never stopped, because Berlin was supposed to be under the control of all four wartime allies.
After the end of the Cold War, and the reunification of Germany the checkpoints were no longer needed. The big concrete buildings of Checkpoint Bravo are now used by the German Customs Service . Checkpoint Charlie was only a wooden hut in the street. It was moved to what is now the Allied Museum at 110 Clayallee, and a small replica put up in Kochstraße. The fake checkpoint is very popular with tourists who have their photographs taken in front of it.
Customs
Most countries have a Customs Service. The customs service works mostly at ports, airports and the countries borders to make sure that people do not bring things into the country which are banned, or that the right amount of tax has been paid on goods that can be "imported" (brought into the country).
Some customs officers work at a post office. They do not meet the public, they examine letters and parcels which have been sent from outside the country, to make sure nothing illegal is being brought into the country.
In the United Kingdom the customs service was called "Customs and Excise". This is because it was once two separate bodies. The Customs service collected tax (called customs duty) on goods being brought into the country, for example brandy from France or tea from India. The Excise service collected tax (called excise duty) on goods made in the country, for example Scotch whisky or Irish whiskey. Today all cars and lorries must pay a tax to be allowed to drive on the road. Although most people call this "road tax" or "car tax", it is officially called "vehicle excise duty".
Whisky
Whisky, or whiskey, is an alcoholic drink distilled from grain and aged in wooden .
The name comes from a gaelic word. In Ireland, it is called whiskey, with an added letter 'e'. Whiskey made in the United States often uses the Irish spelling.
There are many kinds of whisky, of which most important are:
Most whiskys contain around 40% alcohol.
Scotch whisky is legally defined by Scotch Whisky Order of 1990 (UK), and the Scotch Whisky Act of 1988.
These say that Scotch whisky must:
Alcohol is a favorite way to collect tax (called excise duty) in the United Kingdom. When Gordon Brown, a Scot, became Chancellor of the Exchequer, he concentrated on taxing beers and wines, and did not increased the duty on whisky. This, he said, was to help the Scotch whisky industry to recover, increase exports and make more money.
Iocaste (moon)
Iocaste or ', is a non-spherical moon of Jupiter. It was found by a team of astronomers from the University of Hawaii led by Scott S. Sheppard in 2000, and given the designation '.
Iocaste orbits Jupiter at an average distance of 20,723,000 km in 609.427 days, at an inclination of 147° to the ecliptic (146° to Jupiter's equator) with an orbital eccentricity of 0.2874.
It was named in October 2002 after Jocasta, the mother/wife of Oedipus in Greek mythology.
Iocaste belongs to the Ananke group, believed to be the remnants of a break-up of a captured asteroid.
The moon is about 5 kilometres in diameter and appears grey, similar to C-type asteroids.
Chaldene (moon)
Chaldene or ', is a non-spherical moon of Jupiter. It was found by a team of astronomers from the University of Hawaii led by Scott S. Sheppard, "et al." in 2000, and given the designation '.