Emergency Preparedness

Six months ago, Orange County transit officials sat down to develop a plan to address a potential nationwide fuel crisis. The worst-case scenario? Gasoline selling for $4.50 a gallon. "Our worst-case is now emerging as our best-case scenario," Art Leahy, chief executive of the Orange County Transportation Authority, recently told KNX-AM (1070) radio. OCTA operates about 475 buses that carry 225,000 riders daily; Metrolink carries an additional 11,000 daily riders in the county.

As floodwaters slowly receded from much of Iowa on Wednesday, authorities focused their attention on a swollen Mississippi River that punched through at least two levees in western Illinois and increasingly threatened hamlets in Missouri. Federal officials said as many as 30 levees were in peril, mostly in rural stretches of northern Missouri and western Illinois. No large population centers were threatened. "The concern now is the Mississippi River between the Quad Cities and St.

After the great floods of 1993 swamped this tiny town in eastern Iowa, Mike Luck begged the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to help protect it from future disasters. Corps officials responded that this community of fewer than 700 residents probably would have to chip in more than $1 million to help build the federally engineered levee system it sought, the former mayor recalled.

A major effort to seismically retrofit hospitals has been repeatedly pushed back in recent years over concerns about costs. A campaign in Los Angeles to create a list of concrete buildings that would be vulnerable to major shaking faltered. An effort to better track high-risk buildings in San Francisco also stalled. "Any time you don't have an earthquake for a long time, peoples' concerns go elsewhere," said Kate Hutton, a staff seismologist at Caltech.

When the Chino Hills earthquake hit July 29, Heidi Gallegos was having lunch with an associate in nearby Diamond Bar. "Once the jolt hit, we were, like, frozen and watching the doors, thinking 'Do we stay or do we go?' " said Gallegos, chief executive of the Regional Chamber of Commerce -- San Gabriel Valley. A mile south on Diamond Bar Boulevard, diners at the Whole Enchilada were "in shock," General Manager Sandy Ball said.

Fear and foreboding gripped this still-mending city Thursday as a potential Category 3 hurricane whirled toward the Gulf Coast on the eve of Hurricane Katrina's three-year anniversary. Tropical Storm Gustav, which was lashing Jamaica after Haitian officials said it had killed 51 people there, was still almost five days away from the Crescent City, according to the National Hurricane Center.

Hurricane Gustav neared the Gulf Coast early today with the first bands of its destructive rage, winds slightly weakened but still potent enough to spark a massive all-day exodus that all but emptied New Orleans and clogged Southern highways with nearly 2 million evacuees. Spread 440 miles across the Gulf of Mexico, the storm had degraded slightly from the Category 4 status reached over the weekend, weather forecasters said.

Three years after disgracing itself with a bungled response to Hurricane Katrina, the Federal Emergency Management Agency acknowledged Monday, as it mobilized against the force of Gustav, that it had learned some lessons. Nearly 2 million Gulf Coast residents were evacuated to shelters by plane, train and bus hours before Hurricane Gustav hit Louisiana. Helicopters sat on the fringes to start search-and-rescue efforts as soon as the skies cleared.

Government agencies should better coordinate their response to increased toxic emissions from Kilauea volcano, the Environmental Protection Agency's on-scene coordinator said. "There's a huge increase in the amount of a hazardous substance that's being released into the environment," said Janet Yocum of the EPA. "Not only does this affect the Big Island, it affects the entire state." The first eruption at Kilauea's crater since 1924 has brought an increase in volcanic gas emissions since March.

With Hurricane Ike gathering strength over the warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico on Wednesday, authorities ordered mandatory or voluntary evacuations in four low-lying counties along the Texas coast as frail and elderly residents were bused to safety inland. Ike barreled across the gulf past Cuba, strengthening into a Category 2 hurricane with maximum winds near 100 mph.