Hurricane Gustav had been milling around the Caribbean for several days with only a vague threat for the northern Gulf coast. The menacing storm appeared potentially devastating to an area with memories of Katrina still fresh almost exactly 3 years later. But Gustav would prove to be a routine hurricane, not the “mother of all”.

The psyche of emergency managers at ground zero of the greatest U.S. natural disaster of modern time is an interesting study. With the botched response from FEMA, the lack of communication between federal, state and local governments- all combined with the shear scope of disaster, this was a human tragedy on a historic scale. Now it looked as though the cataclysm was about to repeat itself. No wonder the pendulum swung from one extreme to the other. No wonder every level of government was vowing not to let this be a Katrina sequel. But politics somehow always gets injected into this type of equation, especially in an election year. So we behold politicians falling over each other to be on top of the situation.

Let’s compare Katrina and Gustav. You can’t say “Gustav” without “gust”, and winds gusted to 86 MPH at Grand Isle, Louisiana this morning. At Baton Rouge, a gust to 91 MPH was recorded at 2:12 PM this afternoon. Winds in the New Orleans area peaked at 73 MPH at Belle Chase. The storm made landfall at 9:30 AM CDT near Cocodrie, Louisiana as a category 2 hurricane. This is about 70 miles southwest of the Crescent City. Levies have been stressed but appear to be holding. There was some flooding in the upper 9th Ward. This was a damaging weather event, but not the storm of the century. On the other hand, Katrina made landfall near Buras, Louisiana as a strong category 3 hurricane with 126 MPH winds. The New Orleans area experienced category 1 hurricane winds. But the storm surge was 24-28 feet and THAT proved to be the Achilles heal for New Orleans. It was the surge that overwhelmed protective levies, thrusting the city into oblivion under water. 1,836 people lost their lives as a result of Katrina. It was the costliest storm in U.S. history, with losses estimated at $81.2 billion. Gustav has not produced a comparable storm surge.

I’ll never forget that hurricane season. In 2005 there were 28 storms. We had to delve into the Greek alphabet, having run out of storm names on the list (and 2 of those extra 5 storms were hurricanes). The last storm, Zeta, was a rare late December affair that actually bridged 2005 and 2006 (unprecedented). Katrina was only one of three record setting category 5 hurricanes, the others were Rita and Wilma. I remember the water temperature just south of New Orleans was 93 degrees, extremely warm. Wow, what a season that was!

This year is nothing in comparison. The water temperature at the same buoy read 83 degrees this morning, warm to be sure but not of the Olympic magnitude 3 years earlier. Gustav has killed more than 80 people in the Caribbean and briefly rose to category 4 status Friday. But it was moving too fast over tepidly warm water. Plus, the track of the storm has been too far to the west to provide the maximum effect on New Orleans. All of this was known by many meteorologists from the National Hurricane Center (NHC) to me way out here in California. Earlier in the week, discussions from NHC were cautiously admonishing anyone who would listen that specific expectations were premature, for example when the governor of Louisiana mobilized the National Guard and a state of emergency was declared nearly a week before Gustav was forecast to strike somewhere along the northern Gulf coast.

Three years ago Kern County helped out with the Operation Katrina Hope, a multi-faceted effort to bring refugees from the devastated regions of Louisiana and Mississippi to central California for relocation and a new life. This year, Gustav is just another hurricane and a rather routine tropical year. But you really can’t blame people for being nervous once you see what nature can dish up.