Cnn Reports Hurricane Katrina

CNN Reports: Katrina-State of Emergency provides a chronological account of the hurricane through a selection of CNN transcripts and photos documenting all facets of the disaster starting from past studies predicting such a tragedy to the path of the hurricane to the consequences surrounding the flooding and delayed rescue efforts. The book details events in New Orleans and along the Gulf Coast in the days before Hurricane Katrina made landfall and the subsequent weeks of those communities recovering from its destructive wake. The book includes first-hand accounts from many of the more than 200 CNN anchors, correspondents, and production members dispatched to Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Texas, and Tennessee to cover the aftermath. CNN will donate all royalties to the American Red Cross Hurricane Katrina Disaster Relief Fund, with AMP matching that donation.

Although the impact of Hurricane Katrina has certainly been felt in political, economic, and social terms, the impacts on and of the media have largely been ignored. This book tells the stories of the reporters, newspapers, and broadcast stations most affected by Katrina and details their struggles to cover the aftermath.

This scholarly study demonstrates “that while post-Hurricane Katrina New Orleans is changing, the vibrant traditions of jazz . . . must continue” (Journal of African American History). An examination of the musical, religious, and political landscape of black New Orleans before and after Hurricane Katrina, this revised edition looks at how these factors play out in a new millennium of global apartheid. Richard Brent Turner explores the history and contemporary significance of second lines—the group of dancers who follow the first procession of church and club members, brass bands, and grand marshals in black New Orleans’s jazz street parades. Here music and religion interplay, and Turner’s study reveals how these identities and traditions from Haiti and West and Central Africa are reinterpreted. He also describes how second line participants create their own social space and become proficient in the arts of political disguise, resistance, and performance.

"The objective of this report is to identify and establish a roadmap on how to do that, and lay the groundwork for transforming how this Nation- from every level of government to the private sector to individual citizens and communities - pursues a real and lasting vision of preparedness. To get there will require significant change to the status quo, to include adjustments to policy, structure, and mindset"--P. 2.

For a month in the fall of 2002, a series of sniper attacks suddenly dominated the headlines in the nation’s capital. Beginning in the Washington suburbs, these crimes eventually stretched over one hundred miles along I-95 to Richmond. More than a thousand law officers would pursue the perpetrators—an enormous number for one case. The number of reporters covering the story, however, was even greater. On the Trail of the D.C. Sniper uses the remarkable events of that October to explore the shifting character of journalism as it entered the twenty-first century and to question how this change in the way news is gathered and reported impacted the events it covered. Because of its political significance, Washington, D.C., although not a huge population center, is home to an international news corps rivaling that of London or New York. The sniper story thus gained unusually broad media coverage. These events also coincided with the rise of cable network news, meaning that the story would be delivered through a greatly accelerated news cycle. Continuous coverage on television meant a more intense race for scoops; when a major development wasn’t available, lesser incidents were sometimes played up in an attempt to maintain the sense of an always unfolding story. Jack Censer looks at the atmosphere of heightened anxiety in which this killing spree occurred—coming only a year after the 9/11 attacks, as well as the unsolved anthrax scare centered in the D.C. area—and asks if the press, by intensifying its focus, also intensified the sense of fear. To bring in another perspective, Censer looks closely at the elementary and secondary schools in the area, comparing their experience of the threat with the press’s perception, and presentation, of it. In most cases, school officials chose a course of precaution in which life could carry on, rather than one of hypervigilance and lockdowns. Although it is widely thought that journalists have strong political and commercial biases, Censer reveals that in this case the press was motivated, above all, by the creation of a gripping story to evoke emotion from its audience. One of the most detailed studies yet published of how the press follows a story in the twenty-four-hour news era, this book provides a window on post-9/11 anxiety and the relationship between those fears, public events, and the news media.

Recent years have seen an extraordinary number of major disasters, critical incidents and other events that have had major impacts on our world. The 2004 tsunami, hurricanes Rita and Katrina, and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan affect millions of lives daily. Potential events such as Avian Flu pandemic, global warming and the increasing threats of spreading unrest in the Middle East are concerns that weigh heavily on us all. November 8-11, 2006, the Rocky Mountain Region Disaster Mental Health Institute held their Annual four-day Disaster Mental Health Conference. The theme of the conference was "TAKING CHARGE IN TROUBLED TIMES: Response, Resilience, Recovery and Follow-up." This edition contains the major papers presented at the conference and summaries of additional presentations. They address some of the major crisis events confronting our societies in recent years, namely, large disasters such as hurricanes Katrina and Rita; case studies such as Abu Ghraib, and traumatic events such as a night club suicide bombing, the role of cultural sensitivity and ethics in disaster settings, resilience, and the importance of planning, education and taking care of our first responders and mental health professionals. An additional concern with information includes information about preparation of communities and families for deployment and return of military personnel. The importance of planning for how mental health personnel can respond in the event of an Avian Flu Pandemic is also discussed. Presenters are drawn from researchers and responders from Wyoming, the United States, and the United Kingdom. http: //www.rmrinstitute.org The Rocky Mountain Region Disaster Mental Health Institute is a 501(c)3 Non-profit Organization

When the first signs of sunlight emerged from the trickling rain the morning of Monday, August 29, 2005, many residents of the city of New Orleans hoped the worst was behind them. Hours earlier, the tropical hurricane known as "Katrina" made landfall at an area just 70 miles to the southeast of the city, tearing the roofs off buildings and tossing boats like confetti. Tens of thousands of survivors in need of food, water, and medical attention sat stranded along the city's sweltering highways and in the Superdome and Convention Center. Worse, others remained trapped in their damaged homes. In an attempt to coordinate relief efforts, the Federal Emergency Management Agency implemented strict disaster-response rules that made it difficult for organizations to offer assistance and waited a precious five days before sending much-needed supplies to the Convention Center. Hurricane Katrina, Updated Edition explains how the disaster stands among the worst in U.S. history, killing more than 1,600 people, and destroying 200,000 homes along the Gulf Coast. More than a million fled the Gulf region, where economic losses and property damages from flooding were expected to reach a record $125 billion.

The advent of the twenty-first century was marked by a succession of conflicts and catastrophes that demanded unrestrained journalism. Hoskins and O'Loughlin demonstrate that television, tarnished by its economy of liveness and its impositions of immediacy, and brevity, fails to deliver critical and consistent expositions of our conflicting times.