Lessons from history: the Titanic
- Engineering can't prevent disasters. All it can do is make them less likely and make their impacts less severe. Water, in particular, always finds a way in. Plan accordingly.
- Everybody gets a seat on the lifeboat. Anything else - like an evacuation plan that only saves people with access to a car - is criminal.
At least when the Titanic sank, rescue was prompt.
That is all I can bear to post about Hurricane Katrina. I know no one from New Orleans, yet the whole affair breaks my heart. I regret that I never saw it in its former glory, but I would trade a lifetime of longing to see it for the lives that were lost.
