Communities across America are asking the questions: What would we do? How would we handle an emergency evacuation? Are we prepared? What plan do we have for our most dependent people?

Images of New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina give rise to those questions and have thrust community vulnerability to the forefront of public conversation.

The Natchez area in its nearly 300 years of recorded history has experienced yellow fever epidemics, tornadoes, floods, fires, ice storms and hazardous chemical accidents. Small tremors resulting from the major New Madrid earthquake in 1811 and 1812 extended to Natchez.

Reportedly the most serious threat to the Natchez area, however, was in October 1962, when a barge loaded with tanks of chlorine sank in the Mississippi River between Natchez and Vidalia.

The tanks contained chlorine that could produce &8220;the equivalent of as much of the poison gas as was used during the first World War,&8221; one report said.

Removing those chlorine tanks from the sunken barge was &8220;one of the most hazardous jobs the Vicksburg District ever faced,&8221; a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers history states.

And the crisis brought together managers from federal, state and local agencies, public and private, to produce quickly &8220;a successful warning system,&8221; said Roy Popkin of Silver Spring, Md.

In a paper for the September 1998 &8220;Natural Hazards Observer,&8221; Popkin said, &8220;There was the possibility of a leak that could spread lethal gas over the area during the month-long salvage effort.&8221;

Included in the disaster-response task force were members of the Corps of Engineers, Mississippi National Guard, American Red Cross, Department of Health, Education and Welfare, U.S. Coast Guard and many local and state law enforcement agencies and other government and health-care institutions.

&8220;We planned for and had in place facilities to support an instant evacuation of everyone living within three to five miles of the salvage site,&8221; Popkin said.

Instead of fire drills in schools, there were evacuation drills. National Guard troops and their large trucks were spread throughout the area.

Students and others learned to don gas masks. Popkin said the plan would have worked.

J.T. Robinson, then the newly elected police chief, happened to be at the Adams County Sheriff&8217;s Office the night the ship-to-shore call came from the barge&8217;s pilot.

&8220;I took the call. He said the barge had sunk below Natchez and had chlorine aboard but was no hazard to river traffic,&8221; Robinson recalled, speaking by telephone from his home in Jackson.

Perhaps no hazard to passing boats and barges, but what of the population exposed to clouds of gas that could form if tanks leaked the poisonous gas into the air?

When Corps of Engineers responders came to the scene, the crisis mode for the Natchez area began, Robinson said. &8220;This was one of the first real crises we ever had,&8221; he said.

&8220;And one thing I remember is that Adams County got a new alarm system out of it.&8221;

Furthermore, the crisis also resulted in a comprehensive evacuation plan. &8220;I remember a big piece of plywood down at the (Natchez) public works vehicle barn on Aldrich Street,&8221; Robinson said. &8220;It had the whole evacuation route on it, covering the whole city and which way everyone would go.&8221;

Asked about plans for people who might have needed help to evacuate &8212; disabled, elderly and those without vehicles, Robinson said, &8220;That&8217;s what the National Guard was for, to get people out who couldn&8217;t otherwise get out.&8221;

Tony Byrne, then assistant manager of the Natchez-Adams County Chamber of Commerce, said the Natchez business district for a while became &8220;like a dead zone. Nobody wanted to do anything. Everyone just wanted to talk about the barge and the chlorine.&8221;

People really did fear for their lives, Byrne said. &8220;It was scary for everyone.&8221;

Robert D. Vessey and Jose A. Aponte, both seasoned crisis managers for the Red Cross, said in a paper on emergency preparedness that the evacuation system in Natchez in October 1962 included sirens, small airplanes and helicopters with public address systems and &8220;National Guardsmen with radios and whistles stationed on every Natchez street corner around the clock.&8221;

Freddie Johnson, then principal at Brumfield School, grades 1 through 6, feared for the 400-plus children at his school and for his own five children, all in Natchez schools, he said. &8220;One of our children was at the school where my wife was. Two were at Brumfield with me. And the two boys were in junior high and high school,&8221; he said. &8220;We really were in a bind. We didn&8217;t know which way anyone would go.&8221;

Drills took place at Brumfield sometimes twice a day during the salvage operation. &8220;It was difficult with the little children to get them on those trucks during the drills. I remember the steps we had to put up to the side of the truck for them. The trucks were lined up all along the street at the school,&8221; Johnson said.

Preparations for evacuation were made in great detail and included moving some people out of the area, said John Anderson, who was public information officer for the Corps at the time. &8220;The evacuation plan was not all that tough,&8221; Anderson, now retired, said by telephone from his home in Vicksburg. &8220;Some of the older people were taken out of nursing homes and flown on those Army planes as far away as Texas. They had a big time, talked about it for months.&8221;

Media coverage was intense at first. However, the chlorine crisis occurred in the same month James Meredith entered the University of Mississippi, and that was a media distraction; also the Cuban missile crisis began only days after the sinking of the barge.

Anderson said he was worried by what happened in New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina. &8220;I would have thought most towns had some kind of evacuation plan,&8221; he said.

Important in the handling of the Natchez crisis was the way all people and agencies worked together, Anderson said.

&8220;And the people of Natchez cooperated in every possible way,&8221; he said. &8220;There were no heroes. We all worked together.&8221;