WaPo Praises Coast Guard's Response

My Uncle Alan was a career Coast Guard pilot. To him, saving a life was about as routine as filing an expense report, an attitude his brothers in the Guard shared. It's not surprising then that the Guard is earning big admiration for its response to Katrina.

Stephen Barr, WaPo's "Federal Diary" columnist, gives this often forgotten branch of the armed services the credit they deserve:

Coast Guard crews have rescued 22,000 people in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama, Petty Officer Andrew Kendrick , a Coast Guard spokesman in St. Louis, estimated yesterday. ...

The work is demanding. Rescue crews that normally would be asked to pluck about 20 people from danger on a tough day have been "doing 100 to 120 hoists" in adverse conditions that include heat and humidity and exposure to contaminated water kicked up by chopper rotors, [Coast Guard rescue swimmer Jason] Shepard said.

The work is hazardous. Pilots have had to hover between electrical and phone wires and drop cables from heights of 10 to 180 feet, Shepard said.

Barr goes on to state something so obvious, let's hope it occurs to Congress as they look into the failures of the Katrina response:

The Coast Guard, in many ways, is a model agency. It is relatively small -- with about 45,000 uniformed and civilian employees -- and believes in "cross-training" so that each employee can perform more than one job.

It also is a part of the Department of Homeland Security, and the Coast Guard's response to Katrina in recent days has again illuminated the importance of capable leadership and a clear chain of command in agencies during a crisis. Hopefully, as Congress moves to probe how the government handled the Katrina crisis, the Coast Guard can serve as a model for fixing what's wrong elsewhere in Homeland Security, including what many perceive as poor leadership at the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

h/t Jim