Cached version of news story 8/30/05 source: New Hampshire Union Leader
EMT's held hostage in New Orleans hotel
Lancaster resident Jennifer Frenette had a brush with martial law yesterday in New Orleans.
When Hurricane Katrina finally passed through the city, she and others who had been virtual prisoners in the Hilton New Orleans Riverside Hotel decided to go outside for some fresh air.
A police officer told them if they didn’t go back inside, they’d be arrested. They went back inside. “It’s martial law. They’re being extra cautious,” she said.
She said news reports, before the power went out, said only 30 percent of the people in the Hilton’s 1,300 hotel rooms were tourists, with the rest being local “refugees.” She said hundreds of people were being fed on the third floor of the hotel.
Frenette, regional coordinator for the Medical Reserve Corps Program in the Office of the Surgeon General, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services in Boston, was in New Orleans for the annual meeting of the National Association of Emergency Medical Technicians.
She and many other meeting attendees were stranded by canceled flights and jammed roadways. Last night Frenette said she didn’t know when she’d be able to get a flight home.
She said there was a certain irony to the fact that hundreds of EMTs in New Orleans were confined in hotels under martial law, unable to do the jobs they are trained to do.
Bright spot: She was elected to the board of directors of the association, and next year’s convention is in Las Vegas, an unlikely place for a weather emergency.
FOOTNOTE:
From the website of the National Association of Emergency Medical Technicians -- http://www.naemt.org/annualMeetingAndExpo/
The NAEMT Annual Meeting will take place August 23 to 27, 2005, at the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center in New Orleans, Louisiana. It will be co-located with EMS EXPO and will feature a full conference program, plus preconference workshops and other special events, including the Annual Awards Banquet set for August 27.
