(Gov Rick) Perry defends waiver in doomed bus trip

[RamboLiberal]

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/092605dnmetritabus.741fed8.html



Texas Gov. Rick Perry on Sunday defended his decision to sign a waiver allowing a bus with an expired registration to transport elderly residents fleeing Hurricane Rita from the Houston area to Dallas.

Twenty-four people died early Friday near Wilmer when a fire spread from the bus's brakes into the cabin, where it ignited several oxygen tanks. It was the worst bus accident in Texas since 1952.

Sunday morning on NBC's Meet the Press and later on CNN's Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer, Mr. Perry said the exceptions he granted for motor carriers did not put people in danger.

Tim Russert, host of Meet The Press, cited a Dallas Morning News story that revealed the doomed bus's registration expired in July.

"You signed a waiver to allow buses like that to go back on the road for the evacuation. Any regrets?" Mr. Russert asked.

[skooooo]

1. blood on his hands?

[OKthatsIT]

4. nah...this isnt a smoking gun.

had they not found a bus to send the old folks to safety, then the govenor would have been accused of abandonment of another kind.

Registration is NOT 'inspection'.

[displacedtexan]

6. But you can't get a registration without an inspection.

This is really bad news for Texans.

We (the collective we-- not just TX Dems) don't approve of any politician who endangers our grandparents.

[Igel]

11. Yeah, but you can have a vehicle registered without

having a valid inspection sticker, and vice-versa.

I just re-registered my car in July ... the inspection sticker expired in August. If I didn't re-register the car next July, in Aug. 2006 I'd have a valid inspection sticker, but no registration.

It's a possibility for the bus. Not likely, but possible.

[JoFerret]

12. Question is---is this a pattern of negligence?

...or a hard decision that had a terrible outcome?
Let's find out before he is let off the hook.

[samdogmom]

2. This made me so sad when I saw it yesterday. My first comment was

maybe if they kept this bus off the road there wouldn't have been a brake/drip/? failure and then the who knows why fire wouldn't have started and finally the oxygen tanks would have stayed intact. Next, my comment was bring on the lawyers. This will be a profitable lawsuit. Sorry Rick--you're gonna pay.

[Name removed]

7. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[saigon68]

32. ADIOS

[skooooo]

10. Why the F*** do they have decrepit old buses sitting around..?

Don't they have money to keep repairs up? Can't they junk dangerous vehicles?

[NYC]

3. Were there no buses with unexpired registrations available?

?

[anitar1]

18. Heard on ABC news that the bus company had a long

history of bad safety inspections and has been in trouble through the years. They must pay off their Rep to stay in business.

[opusprime]

5. Damned either way...

I think the Gov. did the right thing in this case. The bus fire was a freak accident.

What would you rather do?

Take a chance getting out of town in a vehicle with an expired tag?

or Wait and hope that Rita doesnt level your whole neighborhood?

Me? I'm curious how a bus full of diesel fuel, which is not highly flamable, can catch fire so fast.

[Weembo]

8. Oxygen tanks

[bhairava]

9. Did you read the story?

Every mention of this incident reports the fact that oxygen tanks exploded when the fire spread to the cabin. Vehicle registration and inspection stickers are for safety reasons. Brakes failing is NOT a freak accident; it is a preventable thing. Anything that might happen because of bad brakes is also preventable. Brakes are just the sort of thing that are checked in an inspection like bald tires. If bad tires had caused the bus to veer off the road that too would not be a freak accident. Governor goodhair did not do the right thing. He took a chance with other people's lives and lost.

[yellowcanine]

37. How about putting frail elderly people on the new buses and saving the

old expired tag ones for able bodied people that aren't toting oxygen tanks?

[Polethebear]

13. Perry is full of crap....

game over....bottom line

[truthisfreedom]

14. i'm unable to rush to judgement on this one. they haven't figured out what

caused the fires, and i'm not sure if i have the heart to blame anyone for trying to save people and bend the rules during a time of emergency. what we may have discovered in this instance is that buses in general are incredibly unsafe with oxygen tanks inside them, and perhaps what will be learned is a way to protect the tanks, or a special design consideration for buses carrying them. the bus's registration expired in July? excuse me... that's two months ago. if it expired at the end of July that's less than 2 months. what could possibly go so catastrophically wrong with a bus in two months of being parked? it's likely that the inspections department has something to answer for... possibly for overlooking something seriously wrong with the bus over a long period of time.

[ClintonFor08]

15. Realistically, it had nothing to do with the expired permits

and everything to do with the O2 tanks. I have high regard for the Texas officials. They were quick in evacuation plan and of the largest city. If only LA's officials would have done that, hundreds of lives would have been saved.

Lets not partisan politics get into the way of the truth. :)

[A-Possum]

17. Actually, NO evacuated a far higher percentage of their populace

NO evacuated 80% successfully, an amazing success that's been totally overlooked. Houston only managed 50%, and they have admitted they weren't prepared for that many--they expected only half of that. Hence the gridlock.

Yeah, Houston is a bigger city, so they should have started much earlier. They didn't even let out the schools until Wednesday, so there was a huge surge of people Wed. evening. They needed to have far better and faster reactions with contra flow and gas staging. Both were part of the state plans and neither was done effectively or quickly because of flaws in the plan. If the storm had come into Houston it would have been as bad as NO or worse. Many many people turned around and went home--that didn't happen in NO. Houston got lucky.

And next time, in Houston, people will be afraid to stay and afraid to evacuate. Great choice. Houston shouldn't be crowing, they should be taking a hard look at what's going to happen next time and how to address the problems exposed this time.

[Bridget Burke]

19. Houston is not "crowing"

One problem was that so many evacuated who were NOT in danger from storm surge. If the storm had hit directly, most of Houston would have been much messier but NOT as bad as NOLA. Our floods don't need to be pumped out. The nursing home is in Bellaire--not Galveston.

The State is the only governing body that can set up contraflow lanes. This had never been done before; planning will help the next time. And the State was responsible for ensuring that gas would be available along the evacuation route. Oops.

[A-Possum]

34. Exactly

Actually I should have said Texas shouldn't crow (and they have.) The mayor of Houston made it very very clear that the contraflow and lack of gas were failures in the state's execution of their plans.

As to people evacuating who were not in the storm surge, these people also had excellent reason to evacuate. See this article:

Models show 'massive devastation' in Houston

Houston's perfect storm would feed on late summer's warm waters as it barreled northward across the Gulf of Mexico, slamming into the coast near Freeport.

A landfall here would allow its powerful upper-right quadrant, where the waves move in the same direction as the storm, to overflow Galveston Bay. Within an hour or two, a storm surge, topping out at 20 feet or more, would flood the homes of 600,000 people in Harris County. The surge also would block the natural drainage of flooded inland bayous and streams for a day or more. Coastal residents who ignored warnings to flee would have no hope of escape as waters swelled and winds roiled around their homes. Very likely, hundreds, perhaps even thousands, would die.

Meanwhile, as the storm moved over western Harris County, its most dangerous winds, well in excess of 120 mph even inland, would lash the Interstate 45 corridor, including Clear Lake, the Texas Medical Center and downtown. Many older buildings could not withstand such winds. Anything not tied down, from trees to mobile homes to light poles, would become missiles, surreally tumbling and flying through the air, flattening small houses, shattering skyscraper windows and puncturing roofs.

"Unfortunately, we're looking at massive devastation," said Roy Dodson, president of the engineering firm Dodson & Associates, which Harris County asked to model realistic "worst-case scenarios" for a major hurricane hitting the area.

This is precisely the storm (Freeport landfall) that was headed for Houston for 5 days. Houston remained in serious danger until the last 18-20 hours, way too late to tell people in downtown to evacuate. The answer will never be "don't evacate." It cannot be. You can't tell people who are afraid, and have good reason to be, that they are not allowed to leave.

For an analogy to what could have happened in Houston, don't look at NO, which was on the "good" side of Katrina. Look at Cameron and Lake Charles. They are both 30 or more miles inland, and have lakes which took the storm surge and channeled it higher. Look at Silsbee and Lumberton and extrapolate the damage there to Houston's far more populated area.

Better evac plans, started earlier and drilled ahead of time, with serious, serious attention to the fuel and gridlock problems that developed this time are the only way to go, IMO.

Saying "this had never been done before" is no more of an explanation for Houston than it is for New Orleans. There was plenty of indication ahead of time that a city the size of Houston would be a bear to evacuate, pretty much impossible in the time frame. I was calling my relatives in Houston on Monday and telling them to GO NOW because it would be hellish traffic. They could not leave until Wednesday because school was still in session, and my nephew had "an important test" scheduled. This is absolutely silly; the schools should not be allowed to retain students in that way. If a recommended evacuation is in effect, and it was on that Wednesday, then the schools should not penalize any kid for not attending.

In fact, the worst gridlock began Wednesday evening. One Texas judge I saw interviewed said, "We really expected people to leave a day sooner." The effect of timing of school closing should be looked at closely. These are the kinds of subtle things that can make a huge difference in future plans.

[Bridget Burke]

35. A Houston Chronicle editorial had suggestions for the next evacaution....

Namely:

* A workable Contraflow plan for the freeways.

* Staging evacuations. People in Galveston, on the Bay & on certain Bayous should go first. They are in risk of Storm Surge--which kills more than the wind. Those in other areas should be allowed to go if they wish--but after the others. (Special provisions are needed for those with special needs.)

* Contingency gas distribution.

www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/editorial/3370744

Our City & County are run by some fairly smart people. They will actually learn from the experience.

[A-Possum]

36. Staging evacs

This will only work if the flood prone areas have mandatory evac that ends (everyone out) at least 78 hours before landfall. The mayor of Galveston did great, she started early, but her evacs should have been finished by Tuesday night instead of Wednesday night. People will squeal about the inconvenience of that but it's the only realistic way.

TBH, I don't think you are going to get people to stay because they are told. I frankly wouldn't, although I would start very early, like Monday in this case. That's because I have been in Corpus Christi evac and saw what happened there, total gridlock to San Antonio with a Cat 5 bearing down on us. We got lucky, just like Houston, but it was only luck.

It's a real problem. I think maybe the more workable way for Houston is not to tell people they must stay until the others are out but to have very strict routes in which certain highways are only for evac flood zones. If you want to dedicate I-45 (with contra flow) all the way to 100 miles north of Houston and I-10 West to San Antonio for Galveston and flood zone evacuees, that could work. Only onramps from these zones would be open on those routes. Others would have to use slower highways until say, Wednesday, or according to traffic flow earlier or later. That would make it possible for others to leave w/o clogging the flood evac routes.

LOL, I've been putting a lot of brain power into this problem. It's haunted me since that experience in Corpus 25 years ago...I learned then how impossible it is to clear a city, and have thought about it many times since. Houston was no surprise to me.

[Bridget Burke]

20. Which Texas officials?

The County & City officials who did most of the work? Or the Governor who signed off on questionable buses?

[BikeWriter]

21. The bus had been sidelined for some reason. Perhaps the brakes?

[KittyWampus]

23. Apparently, Bus Company Had Poor Safety Record & The TX Officials SUCKED

they bragged how they'd be better than LA but then had a million people in gridlock for 17-22 hours. People died stuck on the highway. And the oxygen tanks exploded when the fire caused by the tires spread into the cabin.

This IS partisan politics, the GOP made it that way over and over and over again.

[Kailassa]

16. life's a gamble, always,

Sometimes it's only a throw of the dice afterwards that determines whether or not a decision was right or wrong. For all he knew, if he'd refused use of the bus these folks could have all drowned in their nursing home.

[KittyWampus]

24. For All We Know, Perry Signed Off On A Crony'sUnsafe Bus Company.

if Gov. Perry didn't have a SAFE bus company lined up way ahead of time (like since entering office) then it IS his fault.

Perry and every elected GOP gets NO assumption of innocence. The corruption spreads too far in the GOP right now.

[Corgigal]

22. 18 months to investigate

My husband was a Traffic Homicide investigator, yep his actually title and you know something isn't right when it takes 18 months to investigate. He mentioned that this wasn't an airplane crash but a bus crash. He would have it wrapped up in a week. 18 months time frame should tell you that they are trying to hide something.

[rainbow4321]

25. In another words, *after* Nov 2006 elections

Guess he doesn't want more reasons for Texans to say "adios mofo"...as if we don't HAVE enough reasons.
Perry was probably seeing this disaster as his own 9/11, in hopes of coming out looking good. Now this story about the bus kinda screws that whole thing up. So what better way to lessen the damage? Delay the investigation til after Nov 2006 elections.

[KittyWampus]

26. Thanks for posting that. This seals it. A Dem Needs To Nail Perry

for this in the election.

[rainbow4321]

27. Now it's: He signed the waiver hours after the explosion

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/DN-buscrash_27met.ART0.North.Edition2.d7166a2.html

Robert Black, a spokesman for Mr. Perry, said a vehicle registration waiver signed by the governor didn't go into effect until almost four hours after the incident.

"The bus left the Houston area on Thursday and tragically caught fire early Friday morning in Wilmer," Mr. Black said. "The governor didn't issue any waiver until 10:30 a.m. Friday."

Mr. Black said transportation officials made an "inadvertent mistake," the result of confusion over the timeline of events in the last week. By Sunday morning, the story spread from Texas newspapers to national TV news talk shows and appeared to blossom into an embarrassment for the governor.

The governor's press office defended the waiver for almost two days before realizing the error, Mr. Black said. Staff members didn't read news reports on the issue until they returned from a tour of damaged and flooded areas around Beaumont.

[Javaman]

28. Bottom line to the repukes: The old and the poor are disposable..

colossal racist fucks*.

[Delphinus]

29. "Any regrets?"

Suuuure, Tim. Didn't think repubs had it in them to have regrets about people dying.

[noonwitch]

30. I don't blame Perry for this, I blame the owner of the bus

Perry was afraid of a situation like what happened in New Orleans with Katrina. He overlooked a registration renewal to speed up evacuation. The company owning the bus is responsible to make sure it is in shape. Yes, the state could have prevented it by requiring registration, but it was an emergency situation and a bad mistake got made in the rush to get everyone out. It was still looking like a category 5 at that point, too.

I'm not going to trash Perry at this point. He showed some strong leadership after Katrina when his state took in the bulk of the evacuees from the New Orleans area. Not everything is about partisan politics.

[Jack_DeLeon]

31. good post

[Bridget Burke]

33. When did Perry show "strong leadership"?

Houston's Mayor & Harris County officials took the lead in welcoming Katrina evacuees. Perry tagged along.

Mayor White is a Democrat, by the way.