To begin a Sept. 8 panel discussion on "Why Hurricane Katrina Wreaked Such Havoc and What We Can Do About It," Law School Dean Harold Koh listed some of the staggering figures that illustrate the magnitude of the storm's destruction:

* an undetermined number of people dead [early estimates indicated as many as 20,000];

* 80% of New Orleans uninhabitable;

* 5 million people without power;

* 400,000 people evacuated ("the largest mass relocation of American citizens since the Civil War," noted Koh);

* some 23,000 people posting messages in search of missing persons on a website activated by the New Orleans newspaper The Times Picayune;

* 10,000 New Orleans residents still living in the city without services;

* the projection that drinking water may not be fully restored to the region for several years; and

* an estimated $200 billion in damages to hurricane-affected areas.

Some courthouses in the Gulf Coast were literally washed away, and state courts in the area are in "disarray," added Koh, who moderated the discussion. While the arraignments normally handled in state courthouses are being taken over by federal courts, other legal matters -- such as child custody and family issues, and unresolved civil cases -- are currently in limbo.

Yet the damage caused by Katrina is not a surprise to anyone living in the area, said second-year Law School student Elinor Sutton, a panelist at the event who resided in the city this summer.

"From the moment I moved there, people talked about 'Hurricane X,' and how New Orleans would fill up like a bowl," said Sutton, who has taught at a public high school in the city as part of Teach for America and who spent the summer working with prisoners on death row. "It was an accepted part of being there. It was understood that it could happen. So when people say 'How could this happen?' I say, 'It's the worst nightmare come true.'"

Sutton was one of six panelists in the discussion that took place that evening in the Law School's Levinson Auditorium. Others who spoke at the event were Dr. Michelle Barry, professor of medicine and public health and director of the Office of International Health at the School of Medicine; Carol Rose, the Gordon Bradford Tweedy Professor of Law and Organization; Douglas Kysar, a visiting professor at the Law School who teaches at Cornell Law School; Henry Fernandez, a 1994 graduate of the Law School and former economic development administrator for the City of New Haven; and Paul Sullivan, the chief executive officer of Connecticut Blood Services for the Red Cross.

Sutton noted that Hurricane Katrina was the third storm of the season, and thus the people of New Orleans and surrounding areas had twice boarded their windows, stocked up with food and other supplies and made sure they had an axe in their attics -- only to have the previous two storms be fairly benign. The city had even redesigned its evacuation plans following a disorderly evacuation last year prior to Hurricane Ivan, she recalled. That storm ultimately spared New Orleans by moving off its originally projected path.

When it became apparent that Katrina could be the fiercest storm yet to hit the area and a mandatory evacuation order was issued, the people who could leave the area had already done so for the most part, Sutton said. Those who remained in the city couldn't leave because they did not have cars, couldn't afford gas or had nowhere to go, she commented.

"I talked to some of my students and said 'You have to leave; this isn't one of the normal ones [storms],'" recounted Sutton. "In the aftermath, there are lots of 'I don't knows.' I can't find my students; I don't know where they are."

Sutton said that the problems of racial tension and violence in New Orleans -- which have been a focus of media attention since the storm -- are also not new news: These long-standing issues have only risen to the foreground as a result of Katrina. Likewise, she added, there has always been talk about the inadequate levees at election times, but other problems in the city have repeatedly taken precedence.

Sullivan told the audience that, as of that date, some 160,000 people had been evacuated by the Red Cross and that 150,000 of them are now living in 550 shelters operating across the country. Some 32,000 people have volunteered to help in the Red Cross' recovery and relief operations, but another 40,000 volunteers will be needed in coming months to help at shelters and to assist people with mental health needs and with bureaucratic issues such as insurance, he said.

He called upon audience members to lend support by donating money, volunteering for the Red Cross and other organizations, and offering housing and shelter to people who had to leave their communities, and urged them to "be prepared" (in terms of having emergency training, donating blood and obtaining emergency supplies) for potential natural disasters or other threats to their own communities.

Kysar recalled the many years of debate over the construction of the levees that were built near Lake Pontchartrain in New Orleans, noting that the existing levees did not follow the original designs created by the Army Corps of Engineers. He told of how a group of environmentalists, sports fisherman and other community members opposed the Corps' design, in part because the plan called for the development of nearby wetlands. This group succeeded in getting an injunction against the Army Corps of Engineers' "Barrier Plan," instead proposing an alternate design called the "High Level Plan." While the Corps initially argued that this plan would offer inadequate protection because the levees would be prone to erosion and damage around their stone walls, it later supported the Barrier Plan.

Hurricane Katrina has fully exposed the inferior protection of this design, said Kysar, who argued that the various environmental laws that impacted the project, along with the vigorous opposition of an activist group, combined to create "a perfect storm of governmental failure."

Another reason for the disaster, Rose maintained, was the degradation of the coastal environment by human activity, including the construction of the levees, which interfered with a natural system of vegetation growth and removed protective sediments from the wetlands. She said that estimates of the loss of Louisiana wetlands have ranged from 17- to 40-square miles a year. She added that national policies regarding flood control and the global warming that has contributed to some of the storms in the area could also be blamed for the severity of damage from Katrina.

Rebuilding New Orleans, Rose predicted, would likely result in a repeat of the same problems and behaviors faced by the pre-Katrina city.

"If people don't get assistance to rebuild, they will stay away," Rose commented, noting that there are many individuals who support rebuilding the city because "it is a national treasure in a cultural sense." Expressing doubt that the United States would pay the kind of price the Dutch have to build 40-foot dikes in their below-sea-level country, Rose said that if New Orleans is rebuilt, "we better have a backup plan [for evacuation, diversification of industry, etc.] in anticipation of a future Katrina-like storm."

Fernandez, who is currently a principal in Fernandez Advisors LLC, praised the media for its honest, investigative reporting on the hurricane and its aftermath, but said that the federal government was "incompetent" in its handling of the crisis.

"The federal response has been one of spin which continues to today," Fernandez said. As an example, he cited how thousands of firefighters were called in to hurricane-ravaged areas, but instead of being put to use in rescue operations, "FEMA [the Federal Emergency Management Agency] has given them the assignment of passing out leaflets saying 'Call FEMA.'"

Fernandez also said that none of the senior officials handling the crisis -- including presidential adviser Karl Rove, his deputy Scott Morris and FEMA director Michael Brown -- has any emergency management experience. [Brown has since resigned that post.]

"This federal administration simply does not believe in government, which is ultimately what [the situation in] New Orleans shows," Fernandez maintained. He said the response to the disaster by the overwhelmed local government was more efficient, and claimed that the city's police department has received more than its fair share of blame.

"No one joined the police department for this kind of disaster," Fernandez told his audience. "They are not typically first responders; they are not soldiers. Most did not leave their post, despite the fact that most did not know where their families were. Some committed suicide because they were so disturbed by what they saw."

The psychological repercussions of Katrina will be one of the most significant long-term consequences of the storm, noted Barry.

She identified some of the short-term problems of the disaster (acute injuries, drownings, death, electrical fire hazards, water contamination, epidemics of diarrhea and other ailments) and the long-term health issues (mosquito-borne diseases such as West Nile virus from stagnant water and health problems caused by mold, among others). She noted, however, that mental health issues would be the most "striking."

"A cadaver doesn't cause infectious disease but seeing cadavers causes post-traumatic stress," said Barry.

Barry decried the "lack of a public health safety net in the United States," which she blamed, in part, on the federal government's under-funding of public health initiatives, and noted that Hurricane Katrina would result in a huge rise in the need for entitlements such as unemployment benefits, mental health treatment and other services.

Furthermore, said Barry, the lack of official training programs in disaster relief at U.S. medical schools also impedes the nation's recovery from catastrophes such as Katrina.

A discussion about specific actions members of the Yale community can take to support the relief effort followed the panelists' presentations.

"We failed collectively in getting people out of New Orleans and we failed to get them what they needed to survive," said Sullivan. "We can't fail on this: how we help that great displaced population and its critical situation right now."

He added that as those displaced make their way to other American states, everyone will feel the impact of Katrina.

"All of us can be appropriately outraged and heartbroken," he said of the disaster, "but we can channel that into action. This is a disaster that will come to us as people migrate north. Get involved. Offer your skills."

-- By Susan Gonzalez

T H I SW E E K ' SS T O R I E S

Yale community extends helping hand to the victims of Hurricane Katrina

Yale leaders contribute $70,000 to match employee and student donations

Student donates prize money to aid victims of hurricane

Panel examined why Katrina was 'a perfect storm' of failure

Brenzel named undergraduate admissions dean

Studies explore function and formation of feathers

Chinese president's visit postponed

ENDOWED PROFESSORSHIPS

• Richard L. Cohn: Battell Professor of the Theory of Music
  
  
• Lawrence Manley: William R. Kenan Jr. Professor of English
  
  
• Robert S. Nelson: Robert Lehman Professor of the History of Art
  
  
• Susan C. Stokes: John S. Saden Professor of Political Science
  

NBA star to discuss his humanitarian efforts in the Congo

Director Sofia Coppola to give Chubb Lecture

Labor-management training aims to foster cooperation

Project explores how cultural outlook impacts opinions

MEDICAL SCHOOL NEWS

• NIH gives $3.6 million for research to alleviate anxiety . . .
  
  
• Common pesticide linked to reduced fertility in women
  
  
• Most implanted embryos are not viable, says study
  
  
• Study: Hormone therapy for menopause leads to fewer wrinkles
  
  
• Nicotine, long thought to curb appetite, may actually increase it . . .
  
  
• Research shows brain distinguishes between odors inhaled . . .
  
  
• Schizophrenics with diabetes still receive antipsychotic drugs . . .
  
  
• Medical school offering clinical trial of new treatment . . .
  

'Days of Caring'

Event celebrates 400-year anniversary of 'Don Quixote'

Symposium to examine history of U.S. reach into the Pacific

Scientist Pan invited to participate in NAE symposium

Electrical engineer T.P. Ma is honored for solid-state research

In weekly series, World Fellows will debate global topics

University will celebrate Constitution Day on Sept. 20

Multimedia artist presents photo exhibit and video installation at ISM

'A Taste of Bulgaria' to aid flood victims in another corner of the world

Urban infra-power and urban charisma to be explored in conference

Search committee named for School of Art dean

Biophysical chemist Julian Sturtevant . . .

Memorial service scheduled for . . . Robert Abelson

Alumni magazine now reaches every Yale graduate in the U.S.

Campus Notes

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