hmmm... I think that you're both right. California certainly has it worse when you compare it by sheer population numbers to deal with. But New Orleans has the concentrated toxic soup everywhere, especially when mixed with mold and sewage is pretty nasty. A dry climate preserves things much better than a humid one and living outside is easier since the weather is better and it cools at night. Fires are a problem, but in California the dry climate is more at risk. The damp climate with the water is chock full of mosquitoes and rogue alligators, not to mention sewage and corpses. Both places have poisonous snakes.
My husband plans and organizes clean-ups of this size (New Orleans/ CA quakes - he's one of a handful in the world - and he said that he'd rather handle an earthquake in California than something like this because there's just so much of it and water can be a much bigger problem because it becomes a stew - like a witches brew and the chemicals can combine to become something more dangerous. Last year he went through three hurricanes in three different places and he said he'd prefer to clean up an earthquake.
We'll have the disasters again. In fact, a slow moving, possible cyclone is moving toward the Leeward Islands as we speak. If that moves into the Gulf, it would further destroy the stricken areas.
I'm falling asleepas I type. G'night all. Beth