County judge: Bolivar's missing may never be found

[maddezmom]

Source: KHOU

County judge: Bolivar's missing may never be found

Searches continue, no bodies found

GALVESTON, Texas -- Search teams finished a second sweep of Bolivar Peninsula on Thursday and did not find any bodies, the Galveston County judge said. However, as the search of the devastated peninsula transitions from rescue to recovery, Judge Jim Yarbrough cautioned that those missing from Bolivar might never be seen again.

“There's no question we are going to have some missing people (that) we are never going to find,” Yarbrough said Thursday night.

The judge said search teams have scoured about 75 percent of the peninsula, searching through debris for residents who may have never made it off Bolivar before Hurricane Ike laid waste to the area. He estimated too, that about 30 to 40 residents remain on Bolivar despite an order to vacate.

Thus far, no bodies have been found, but the county judge knows that is not likely going to be the case as the search expands.



Read more: http://www.khou.com/news/local/galveston/stories/khou080918_tj_search_bodies_bolivar_ike.8e35ae67.html

[Mnemosyne]

1. ... n/t

[rusty_parts2001]

2. So sad.

[mopinko]

3. did we ever find out how many were missing from katrina?

i seem to recall a couple of websites trying to tally the missing. hard, since so many were scattered in the evacuation. but, did we ever get a number? (i am sure that the feds did not and would not put out any kind of accurate number.)

[ingac70]

5. it was over 700....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hurricane_Katrina

[Usrename]

6. Over a thousand bodies in Katrina.

And still counting. There never was anything set up to try and identify the victims. Nothing like what they did for 9/11. There are many websites that list the 9/11 casualties, but no central data base for Katrina. None.


"In Louisiana, the direct dead count now stands at 902, according to state epidemiologist Raoult C. Ratard. In Mississippi, the number is 223, according to Sam L. Howell, director of the Mississippi Crime Laboratory."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/stacy-parker-aab/still-counting-katrinas-d_b_109056.html

[jobycom]

7. That's out of date. It's 135 now.

http://www.dhh.louisiana.gov/offices/page.asp?ID=192&Detail=5248

That's the source that the Wikipedia article footnotes. It was 705 at one point, but it's been lowered to 135. That's just Louisiana (so was the 705 number). The number of missing in Mississippi was never as high as in Louisiana, for a lot of reasons. I remember reading either the coroner or Civil Defense person in Mississippi saying they had accounted for all the missing in Mississippi, though exactly what that means, I don't know. It might just mean they gave up trying to find the last dozen or so.

[jobycom]

9. Not an easy question.

There were large numbers being reported as missing after Katrina, anywhere from 11,000 to 20,000, but all that number reflected was the complete chaos of the situation. There were several groups compiling these lists, so there was a lot of variance. Also the lists were simple reports that someone somewhere was looking for someone, not that a person was actually missing to everyone. Most of those people were just evacuated somewhere else. There was a story of a mother who didn't find her child for six months, because she had been moved west somewhere, and her child was in Georgia with another relative.

The greatest travesty there was that the federal government did not organize some database of evacuees so that people could search for their missing relatives. There were a lot of individual databases compiled by different private organizations, but if someone didn't know all the databases, they were out of luck. As I recall, a couple of private individuals stepped in to organize a database, and that's how this mother's child was found. I can't even imagine the Hell she went through.

So over time, people were contacted by officials who compiled the missings lists, and most people on the list were identified as either found or dead, or the listing was determined to be invalid. For instance, I looked through the lists and found the name "Abare" in a couple of places. Obviously that's "Hebert," a common Louisiana name. There were also listings where only a first name and a general age range were known, or where one person was listed more than once, maybe with a first name variation--Joe and Joseph, for instance.

Anyway, I don't know what the number missing is listed as now. I found one site that said 135, but it was two years old. And I don't know how complete that number is. They've found a handful of bodies since then. There's a lot of marsh and bayous in Louisiana, and alligators and other things that can get rid of a body, and Lake Pontchartrain is very large. So there are probably bodies that won't be found. There are probably some people missing who don't want to be found. And there may be some who got out safely and died somewhere else.

So, who knows? It's not thousands. It's likely dozens.

[uppityperson]

15. And some unclaimed bodies were recently buried. 3 yrs out, no one claimed them.

No one ID'd them. No one knows who they are. So, I expect there are some missing who no one misses also.

[jobycom]

16. More than likely.

But we aren't talking about thousands, as some of the early rumors claimed. Nor hundreds.

[AnneD]

4. They will work backwards....

We have records of folks that lived there. We will find out who evacuated, compare the lists and have a fairly good idea. I just want folks to know that this was one big assed hurricane with a powerful surge. People were trapped 7 hours BEFORE the eye hit. Most hurricanes the window is 2-3 hours. They were evacuating by helicopter in bad conditions at 8 hours ahead of the eye.

[jobycom]

8. About 50 on the missing list in Bolivar Peninsula, it says.

So not nearly as bad as some had feared.

Given the nature of missings lists, many of those will be located alive, and some dead may not be on it. This is just the number of people who someone has been unable to locate. Some are not aware someone is looking for them. Conversely, if a loner or an entire family is killed, there may be no one left to miss them.

[dysfunctional press]

10. so what happened to the 900 floating bodies...?

:shrug:

it's almost like they...never existed.

[KoKo]

11. In the coming days the search will expand to include area known as Goat Island.....

In the coming days, the search will expand to include the area known as Goat Island. The island is a small strip of land across the Intracoastal Waterway from the peninsula.

Yarbrough said there is a large debris field on that island and is the next logical place to search, but only after a game plan to do so safely can be worked out.

“That is a very dangerous place with all that debris, plus you have lots of snakes and other obstacles,” the judge said.

[dgibby]

12. SNARK ALERT! nt

This is in respose to #9, not #10 (sorry)

[uppityperson]

13. They will need cadaver dogs to find them under debris.

[uppityperson]

14. Some bodies may be found in Chambers County, where the cows washed up.....

http://galvestondailynews.com/story.lasso?ewcd=41e0bcc77ade405d

Some Bolivar Peninsula residents are attempting to leave the area by boat and marine patrols of the Galveston County Sheriff’s office are assisting them, Sheriff Gean Leonard said. Some deputies are stationed on the peninsula for extended periods of time to help recovery efforts. Those deputies are being housed at the Chambers County Sheriff’s Office, Leonard said.

Deputies are almost finished with their door-to-door search for survivors, he said. One person drowned in San Leon, but so far no other fatalities in unincorporated Galveston County have been confirmed.

Leonard said its possible that some people who died trying to ride out the storm on the peninsula could be found in Chambers County, where some dead cattle were found.

“It’s not even something you want to say out loud,” he said. “Once people start asking the whereabouts of their loved ones, that’s going to be the real clue.”...