WBIR-TV

09/06/05

Hurricane Katrina has become the Homeland Security Department's first big test. Since the department was created after the 9/11 attacks to prevent and respond to catastrophes, it has spent tens of billions of dollars, studied disaster scenarios of every imaginable kind and run some of the nation's biggest emergency response drills. It should have been ready for just about anything. But it wasn't ready for the power of Katrina. Today, as workers struggle to provide better relief for survivors, Congress will begin investigating why the government's response was so slow. Sens. Susan Collins, R-Maine, and Joe Lieberman, D-Conn., leaders of the Senate Homeland Security committee, will discuss their committee's plan for an inquiry into the response by the Federal Emergency Management Agency. The agency is the disaster-response division of the Homeland Security Department. 'We intend to demand answers as to how this immense failure occurred,' the senators said in a statement...

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Informant: Thomas L. Knapp