Written by Brian Thevenot and Chris Kirkham
NEW ORLEANS (Reuters) – Months before the deadly vehicle attack in New Orleans on New Year's Day, the city laid out scenarios for how the attacker could enter Bourbon Street at various intersections in a Ford (NYSE:) F-150 taxi similar to a Ford F -150. One of them killed 14 people and injured dozens.
Engineers found that such a pickup truck could enter the crowded tourist strip at speeds ranging from 12 to 70 mph — yet city officials are now installing new street barriers that can withstand impacts of only 10 mph, according to a contracted engineering analysis. It's with the city in April. Bidding documents reviewed by Reuters.
These new barriers, known as “barricades,” have not yet been installed on Bourbon Street on New Year's Eve, but are scheduled to be completed by the Feb. 9 NFL Super Bowl in New Orleans. Documents reviewed by Reuters, which have not been previously published, make clear that the system would not be able to prevent vehicle attacks at medium to high speeds.
In selecting the new barrier system, the city prioritized ease of operation over the viability of the new barrier system because of chronic problems operating the old system, according to documents and a source with direct knowledge of the city's Bourbon Street security planning. Unlike some pedestrian-only areas, such as in New York City's Times Square, Bourbon Street is open to regular vehicular traffic throughout most of the day, requiring city officials to close portions of it from surrounding streets each evening.
Since the New Year's Day attack, officials in New Orleans have faced scrutiny over whether they left citizens vulnerable while crews removed old barricades and installed new bollards. But none of the barrier systems could have prevented the deadly attack, according to the source and a Reuters review of city documents.
The city currently has no barricades at Canal and Bourbon Streets, where the attacker entered, but the road was blocked by a police SUV parked on the side of the road on New Year's Eve.
The suspect in the attack, Shams al-Din Jabbar, an American combat veteran from Texas, exploited another loophole in the city's security planning: He positioned his seven-foot-wide pickup truck on an eight-foot-wide sidewalk between the wall of a pharmacy and a police car, and stomped on it. Throttle and plow through the crowd at about 3:15 a.m
Jabbar died after the attack during an exchange of gunfire with the police. Federal authorities said he had been radicalized and pledged allegiance to the Islamic State.
The city's security modeling, in an engineering study conducted to help select a new barrier system, only took into account scenarios in which a vehicle enters Bourbon Street on the road — not the sidewalk. The source said that the car was unable to enter most Bourbon complexes on narrow sidewalks that have other barriers such as fire hydrants or balconies and street lighting poles.
City officials will face “difficult meetings” about continuing weaknesses in the new barriers now being installed, which “would not have made any difference” on New Year's Day, the person said.
New Orleans city officials did not respond to detailed questions from Reuters about their security planning on Bourbon Street and the decision to choose 10 mph barriers.
The person with direct knowledge of city security planning stressed the difficulty all cities face in protecting against vehicular attacks while maintaining access to routine vehicular and pedestrian traffic, including accessible sidewalks for people with disabilities.
Officials chose a barrier system rated for 10 mph impacts from a company called 1-800-Bollards Inc., the source said. The city's bid documents, dated August and September, asked who would install the system, describing it as a “RCS8040 S10 removable barrier.” The city's April engineering analysis describes the product itself as having an “S10” crash rating and states it can stop a 5,000-pound vehicle. lbs traveling at 10 mph.
“The crash ratings were determined as S10 (10 mph impact), S20 (20 mph impact), and S30 (30 mph impact),” the engineering analysis said.
A barrier rated for 10 mph impacts could still slow down or cause significant damage to a faster-moving vehicle, the source said.
Representatives for 1-800-Bollards Inc. declined to comment.
Two of the attack scenarios on Bourbon Street, designed by city-contracted engineers, involved entering the street in a straight line, without turning, after increasing speed.
The study found that a 2015 F-150 can achieve speeds of up to 50 mph by accelerating from a stop sign across Canal Street, a wide street with streetcar tracks in the middle. The same vehicle can reach speeds of up to 70 mph when entering from the opposite end of the section of Bourbon Street protected by barriers.
Jabbar was driving a more lethal weapon than the truck used in the report's scenarios — the newer F-150 Lightning, a faster, heavier, and quieter electric vehicle.
During major events like New Year's or Mardi Gras, the city's security plans call for large vehicles to be parked at the ends of Bourbon Street that are most vulnerable to high-speed vehicle attacks, the source said. But such measures, the person said, are not practical on a daily basis in the crowded tourist area.
“Bourbon Street Juice”
Since at least 2020, city officials have considered how best to replace New Orleans' failed street barrier system to protect against vehicular attacks, the source said.
The city installed its first barrier system after coming under pressure from federal officials in 2017 to protect Bourbon Street following a series of car attacks globally, including one in 2016 that killed 86 people and injured hundreds in Nice, France.
New Orleans initially chose a system called the Heald HT2 Matador that allows workers to move barriers into place along tracks in the street, according to city documents. The system was chosen largely because it had already been rolled out and priced by the federal government, allowing the city to install it faster, the source told Reuters.
But the barriers have proven problematic under the rigors of Bourbon Street — and are often inoperable as the paths become crowded with trash including Mardi Gras beaded necklaces.
In addition, the mechanism for locking and unlocking the barriers was embedded in the street and often became immersed in what the source called “Bourbon Street juice” — a mixture of street dirt, trash, rainwater, spilled drinks, and sometimes vomit that gave tourist stripping its stench.
“To open it, you have to dip your hand in Bourbon Street juice,” the person said. “It was a disgusting job. You can't make anyone do that.”
Held, the manufacturer of the poles, said in a statement that they had not been moved into place to block Bourbon Street before the attack, “and therefore, they did not malfunction.”
The company said the system was working effectively, with “basic maintenance and cleaning”.
Lighter barriers
Because of these issues, the city prioritized factors including ease of operation and maintenance over crash safety ratings when selecting a new system, according to the source and an April 2024 report by Mott MacDonald, an engineering firm the city hired to evaluate dozens of barriers. Options.
Representatives for MacDonald's death did not comment.
The report identified three different failure classification criteria for barrier systems. It concluded that the highest crash rating, which can withstand the impacts of 15,000-pound vehicles traveling at 30 to 50 mph, was not “compatible” with the city's needs to move barriers every day.
“It will be necessary to use specialized lifting equipment such as a truck-mounted crane or heavy machinery” to move such columns daily, the report said.
The city chose the 1-800-Bollards Inc. system with a 10 mph rating, relatively lightweight stainless steel bollards that drop onto street foundations, partly because the bollards can be installed and removed daily by a single city employee, the source said. . . The engineering analysis said these poles weigh 44 pounds, while similar 20 mph poles weigh 86 pounds.
The report itself included modeling of the attack scenario. In addition to those showing potential speeds of 50 mph and 70 mph, all other scenarios showed the F-150 could turn into Bourbon at speeds between 12 mph and 20 mph without hitting the curb or running down the curb – That exceeds the 10 mph crash rate for the system the city chose.
The main concern of city officials, along with French Quarter residents and business representatives, was protecting pedestrians from vehicles heading onto Bourbon from side streets at low speeds, the source said.
The report scored different systems according to different criteria. The system the city ultimately selected received a discount in its “safety rating” score because it “did not meet specific project requirements.”
It received higher marks for the weight of the candles and their low cost.
