Question Authority: Why its wise to ignore officials during emergencies.

[Greebo]

http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/13.06/start.html?pg=3

Interesting article by Wired, although I don't agree that it's ALWAYS smart to ignore officials.

Of course, the officials who sent citizens streaming in a panic into the streets in DC, making them even more open targets for possible air-borne contaminates - well, I'm all for ignoring them too...

 

[AdamZ]

Wow! very interesting. Bet you won't see that story on any major news outlests.

 

[wsuffa]

Wow! very interesting. Bet you won't see that story on any major news outlests.

Nor will you hear it from anybody in politics or government at any level.

Knowledge is power, and as long as government officials claim to have the knowledge and expertise, they won't want to give it up.

 

[RotaryWingBob]

http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/13.06/start.html?pg=3

Interesting article by Wired, although I don't agree that it's ALWAYS smart to ignore officials.

Of course, the officials who sent citizens streaming in a panic into the streets in DC, making them even more open targets for possible air-borne contaminates - well, I'm all for ignoring them too...

They had to send them out, Chuck. I mean there was a killer 152 out there!

 

[silver-eagle]

The biggest problem with a mass evacuation from a large building (over 500 people) is the congestion on the stairwells which, like the highways, have bottlenecks such as on-ramps and slower traffic. Had the evacuation of both towers begun as soon as possible, there might have been adequate time to complete it. Certainly, a lot more people might have been saved.
But that said, knowing the building I'm in is burning, I'm making tracks, with or without my bosses approval.

 

[mikea]

Living in Chicago I always assume that in an emergency I'm on my own. Ya gotta deal with the idgits the city hires to understand.

I was once once on the CTA L train waiting in a downpour for the next train. There's an overpass with stairs going across the tracks from one platform to the other. The supervisor sent every body up the stairs on our side, saying the next train would leave from the other platform.

At the same time the guy on the other platform told those coming down on that side to go back up. The result was I was in a 100 person pileup as everybody went UP both sides at once. All this time the rain is howling and the supervisor is screaming for them to go UP, which they were. I was sure we would have a disaster. Finally the guy on the end I started from told the people to come down.

The train came eventually right where I was in the first place. All this time the rain flying horizontally. My stop is the one after the next. Everybody piles on the train. It goes one stop and the operator announces that it will not be making any more stops until the end of the line. Everybody piles off into the rain again.

I am very sure that they would get us killed by the 1000s in an actual emergency.

Today Duh Mare went on TV and said that the TV cameras they have everywhere are what are keeping us all safe. At least he didn't say he needs a no fly zone over the city again. There was a TV reporter in helicopter over downtown saying how nice it was they could still fly there.

If they say go left, I'm going right. If they close the streets I'll walk in the river.

 

[fgcason]

But that said, knowing the building I'm in is burning, I'm making tracks, with or without my bosses approval.

Yep. Right behind ya. And if you slow down even a smidgen, we're talking Deep Impact VS Tempel 1.


When it comes to survival it's best to let the rules and authorities work for you whenever possible. Sometimes the officials have the right solution (don't walk into the green glowing pulsating cloud), sometimes they don't have your better interest in mind and you should act accordingly. I'm not suggesting obey the rules or to disobey them, just to consider how the mindless masses obeying the rules can give you a clear escape route sometimes.

Declare 91.3 and use your best option. The best way to survive a disaster is to not be there when it happens.

If the boss commands get into the inside stair well when a tornado is coming, unless the F-# vacuum cleaner is right on top of me, I'm outta there and on the road because my best chances are to outmaneuver it.


Interesting side story: In college, one of the professors (philosophy IIRC) had a huge Print Shop (Apple II) continous feed 8.5x11 paper banner several feet long over his door that said "QUESTION AUTHORITY". On his door was a very small sign in font 10 saying "authority". I never got around to taking his class.

 

[wsuffa]

Today Duh Mare went on TV and said that the TV cameras they have everywhere are what are keeping us all safe.

He does know that London has more security cameras than any other city in the world?

At least he didn't say he needs a no fly zone over the city again.

That's 'cause he got what he really wanted... Meigs is closed.

 

[bstratt]

The tallest building in Toronto is First Canadian Place. I was working there on the 24th floor when the fire alarms went off. Everyone lined up in front of the exit doors as in a drill casually chatting. Then we heard footsteps pounding down the stairs. Out of curiosity we opened the door - the guy in front yelled "smoke" - sure enough we could see and smell smoke in the stair well. Well that was the end of orderly and calm as everyone raced through the door and we went down 24 stories to exit on ground level. I ended up helping a 62 year old co-worker down the stairs who was having difficulty. It turned out to be a fire in a telephone switchboard a few floors above us.

Count me as one of the first one down the stairs.

 

[pete177]

Ok, read the article. As one who's studied this sort of mayhem for some time and currently makes a living mitigating said mayhem for the US military, my advice would be not to ignore authority should they be giving you reasonable instruction, instruction that made sense to you. Obviously, in hindsight, staying put in the towers was a mistake but had the circumstances been a bit different it may have been the right thing to do. Suppose the firefighters could have gotten upstairs to put the fire out but were blocked by fleeing inhabitants? We all know now that it wouldnt have helped but had the fire been less intense it may have been possible to put it out. The authorities that make these calls today spend many hours training and studying the very scenarios it is their charge to protect you from. They're not always right, but given the same level of information, they're judgement is likely to be better than yours.
If the cessna that penetrated the adiz had been carrying a large old artillery round smuggled in through canada or stolen in the US and detonated it as it crashed into the capital building, well, they have something like a 50 or 100 meter casualty radius so you do the math. Theyre the same devices the bad guys are using for ied's all over iraq. They're everywhere. Any idea how many landmines are out there? How hard do you think it would be to dig a few up, use the mil grade explosive to make a really nice 500lb bomb and fly it into a building. Ya ever been on the canadian border? There's nothing for miles and miles and plenty of cover in some places. Very easily crossed. Anyway, in that scenario its best to get people out of the target area. The use of chemical or biological weapons being spread by aircraft, in my view, is a distant 2nd place given the difficulty in weaponizing the stuff and distributing it effectively. So, given that the most likely scenario of an explosives type attack the authorities did the right thing. If they were really smart they would have ushered the people into routes that took them upwind just in case. Anyway, my 2 cents.