Two weeks ago Gov. Roy R. Romer of Colorado rejected the trailer park residents' demand to be permanently evacuated, saying such a step is unwarranted.

Certainly the population living adjacent to the Midwestern rivers that periodically overflow should be permanently evacuated.

In the most dramatic move to protect citizens, the Government in 1982 and early 1983 permanently evacuated all 2,240 residents of Times Beach, Mo., where the dirt roads had become contaminated with dioxin.

"It is a disaster of the magnitude of Centralia," he said, referring to the town in Pennsylvania that had to be permanently evacuated because of an uncontrollable underground mine fire.

Millions of people were exposed to radiation, and 350,000 were permanently evacuated from their homes.

To escape the heaviest bombardments, many people in the central areas left the town to sleep in hedgerows with some being permanently evacuated.

The town was permanently evacuated at the request of Phillips 66 Oil Company.

After the flood of June 2008, the Museum building was permanently evacuated.

In 1957, nuclear wastes stored by the Soviet Union in a remote mountain region of the Urals exploded: radioactive contamination affected thousands of square miles, and several villages had to be permanently evacuated.