New Orleans - Contraflow was supposed to alleviate the grid lock experienced during past hurricanes. Unfortunately for Gustav, it didn't work as well as most would like.
For tens of thousands travel on a stretch of I-59 that normally takes less than an hour stretched into seemingly endless hours.
Nadine Gauthier worried about her 81-year-old mother, Lorna Parnell.
“She started to get concerned. My Mom worried, ‘Are we going to have enough gas? Is the storm going to hit us while we're on I-10? Those were her biggest things what are we going to do?’”
Her husband Joe said, “She was good until we sat the first hour or so without moving. Then she started to get paranoid. (She was) worried about the home, worried about if we're going to make it. She kept worrying about the gas.”
The Gauthier’s and Parnell left Belle Chasse before sunrise the Sunday Gustav approached the Louisiana coast.
“Hearing that there was supposed to be a 25 foot wall of water coming through here. We didn't want to have to be here with her with that,” said Mr. Gauthier.
Unfortunately no one imagined the toll the evacuation would take on Parnell. The Gauthier’s were originally headed to a small town in Mississippi. They planned to take I-10 east then move north, but with that route closed their journey became a grueling 17 hour drive to Poplarville.
“No exits, no gas, no facilities no nothing,” Mrs. Gauthier exclaims.
Joe said, “I think it was somewhere around one o'clock in the morning when we got to an exit where they were pumping gas and you could get gas.”
Another 10 hours on the road found the family in Greensville, Ga.
Less than 24 hours after arriving in Greensville Parnell suffered a heart attack. She had another heart attack a week later in Montgomery, Al, endured a triple bypass and finally a stroke before begging to go home.
“I spent over a month watching her die and that was the hardest thing,” cried Nadine Gauthier. She died less than a week after being transferred by ambulance to a local hospital.
“If we would have stayed would it have been any different for her we'll never know,” said Mr. Gauthier.
What the Gauthiers do know is that they want better communication and coordination during an evacuation. In Joe Gauthier’s opinion, “You can sit there and figure out this is the best way to go and all, but are they the ones that's in it. No. They don't know what it's like to be on the road stuck. Not knowing where you are going to get your gas; where you are going to be able to rest; they don't know that.”
Both Louisiana and Mississippi emergency planners promise better conditions if contra-flow needs to be put into action this year, but Mississippi is holding firm on one of the biggest complaints.
Mike Womack Director of Mississippi's Emergency Management Agency says during an evacuation I-10 east can not handle the traffic.
“We've had that conversation with Louisiana about that and people from Louisiana need to go I-59 North, I-55 North or I-10 West. Those are the three routes they need to take. If you take I-10 eastbound all you're going to do is get caught up in the Mississippi evacuation. Did you happen to see what i-10 looked like for Gustav evacuation? It was backed up all the way to Pascagoula, past the Alabama line. I hope this year that the Louisiana officials are going to agree with us.”
While Louisiana officials have asked to have that route open during contra-flow Mississippi is soundly against it.
“They're just going to get stuck in congestion there (I-10). Plus you don't know if the storm is going to change tracks. At 30 hours it could still easily move back to the east. Wherever you evacuate to you could have to evacuate again or have worse damage than if you had stayed in the city. All the traffic planners, all the scientist say it doesn’t make since for people to try to evacuate east on I-10. It makes more since west bound on I-10 because you'll be going into areas that aren't going to be so susceptible to the storm further inland,” said Womack.
Both Louisiana and Mississippi agencies are vowing to make the contra-flow routes more comfortable, but the across the board advice mimics Womack, “That's why I emphasize to everyone if you feel you're going to evacuate make the decision early get out before the contra- flow even starts and then you won't have those issues.”
The Gauthier's plan to heed that advice.
“I don't want to try to go that way again. I would try to choose a different route. Try to get out a day or two early before they start the mandatory evacuation,” Mr. Gauthier said.
They also recognize it will still be a difficult road.
“There has to be a better coordination. You can't shut off each exit. I know people have to get out and somewhere there has to be some kind of system where there's gasoline available, and there's facilities available,” Mrs. Gauthier said.
That is gas and facilities that emergency planners have promised for the next evacuation.
