US government admits Hurricane Katrina lapses

Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff has acknowledged widespread lapses in the government response to Hurricane Katrina as a Congress report blasted the official failures.

Chertoff told incredulous senators that when he went to bed on the night of the storm, which killed about 1,300 people, he did not believe that Katrina had been as bad as many people had predicted, Agence France-Presse reported.

Chertoff took the blame for much of the criticism of government since the August 29 hurricane that devastated much of New Orleans and the US Gulf Coast.

‘I’m accountable and accept responsibility for the performance of the entire department, the bad and the good,’ he told the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee.

‘There are many lapses that occurred,’ he admitted.

‘It is completely correct to say that our logistics capability in Katrina was woefully inadequate,’ Chertoff added, while promising changes by the time the next hurricane season starts in June.

Separately, a report by a select committee of House of Representatives Republicans was released yesterday which concluded that planners had failed to act on warnings before Katrina laid waste to New Orleans and the surrounding region.

‘Our investigation revealed that Katrina was a national failure, an abdication of the most solemn obligation to provide for the common welfare,’ lawmakers said in the report.

http://www.forbes.com