First on New Year’s Day, a man who was driving a pickup truck carrying the Islamic State group flag into a group in New Orleans, Louisiana, opened fire on the area, killing at least 14 people and injuring about 30 others. The FBI is looking into it as a potential act of terrorism, and officers have labeled it as a deliberate harm.
Bourbon Street, one of the biggest gathering spots for New Year’s Eve events, was the scene of the attack. Huge crowds had gathered in the area ahead of the Sugar Bowl’s College Football Playoff quarterfinal, which had been postponed.
Safety issues and before planning
City leaders in New Orleans had created possible cases months prior to the deadly New Year’s Day attack, including one using a Ford F-150 delivery truck to cross Bourbon Street at different intersections, according to news organization Reuters.
A study found that a vehicle capable of driving through the crowded tourist place could travel at speeds ranging from 12 to 70 miles. However, despite these concerns, the town had decided to install new city barriers—bollards—that can only endure influences at speeds of up to 10 speed. According to the document, this decision was based on a city bidding process and an architectural analysis.
These new bollards, planned to be installed before the Super Bowl in February 2025, were not yet in position during the New Year’s Day harm. A potential weakness in the state’s safety planning was revealed by the Reuters report, who claimed the records reviewed made it abundantly clear that these bollards would not have been able to halt a car traveling at moderate-to-high frequencies. The old bollard system’s regular maintenance made it more important to promote activity convenience over accident security.
New Orleans had been under stress to improve its safety measures since at least 2020, following a series of deadly car attacks worldwide, including the 2016 attack in Nice, France, that killed 86 individuals.
Weaknesses in the city’s Bollard system
The city’s earlier bollard system, installed in response to increasing concerns about vehicle attacks globally, had its own set of issues, the Reuters report said. The Heald HT2 Matador, which was initially used by the system, was used by streetcar drivers to move barriers along tracks.
However, this system became frequently inoperable because debris, such as Mardi Gras beads, jammed the tracks. Additionally, the mechanism to lock and unlock the barriers was often submerged in what one source, speaking to Reuters, called” Bourbon Street juice” —a mix of street grime, spilled drinks, and trash—making it difficult for workers to operate.
Following these problems, city officials made the decision to install a new bollard system designed for 10-mph impacts. Each post weighed just 44 pounds, making these bollards light and simple to operate daily. The 86-pound posts were rated for 20 mph, and each post was lighter and easier to use daily.
However, this new system, which was intended to be installed by a single city worker each day, would not have prevented the attack on New Year’s Day. An F-150 could have sped at speeds of 50 or 70 mph if the system was chosen, which would have prevented vehicles like those simulated in the city’s earlier engineering analysis.
vulnerabilities in security planning and attack execution
On New Year’s Day, the attacker, identified as Shamsud-Din Jabbar, a US combat veteran from Texas, took advantage of gaps in the city’s security planning.
He managed to squeeze his seven-foot-wide pickup onto an eight-foot-wide sidewalk between a drugstore and a police vehicle, then accelerated and drove through the crowd. According to US federal authorities, Jambar was killed in a shootout with police, and he had allegedly endorsed the Islamic State.
The earlier security modeling by the city, which focused on scenarios where a car entered Bourbon Street on the road, did not consider the possibility of a car entering from the sidewalk. The study found that most of Bourbon Street’s narrow sidewalks had existing barriers, like fire hydrants and streetlights, which would have prevented vehicles from entering.
However, Jabbar exploited this vulnerability by driving his vehicle onto the sidewalk.
New Orleans officials have been criticized for their security planning since the attack, with many questioning whether the city had changed its approach and left residents vulnerable. The Reuters report stated in cites the city’s security planning sources, saying both the old and new systems would not have stopped the vehicle from entering the area despite these concerns.
Challenges in security
Since 2020, New Orleans city officials have been looking at ways to improve the city’s security infrastructure, with a particular focus on keeping Bourbon Street safe from car attacks. In 2017, following international vehicle attacks, the city installed its first bollard system.
However, this system’s inefficiencies, combined with the challenges of protecting pedestrians while allowing normal vehicle and pedestrian traffic, led to the decision to replace it with a more easily operable system.
The city’s need to strike a balance between safety and operational efficiency led to the decision to choose the 10-mph bollard system. When compared to higher-rated bollards that would require specialized equipment to move, the new bollards were easier to install and remove daily.
