Leaving the Superdome, but an uncertain future lies ahead
Hurricane Katrina has brought the US Gulf Coast to its knees. Hope that the worst effects of the storm had missed New Orleans, has been replaced by despair that the Big Easy may never recover; its unique multicultural flair flushed away in a torrent of water, oil, chemical and human waste. The city is drowning and those who stayed behind are now cut off, left to fend for themselves and make do without food or basic sanitation. They're forced to roam the streets, which have fast become a desolate, lawless waterworld. It is the chaos New Orleans always feared.
Help is arriving, on a massive and unprecedented scale, but there is anger that the response as has been too slow and ill-coordinated. This may be the worst natural disaster to strike the United States since the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, which claimed the lives of 6,000 Americans. New Orleans Mayor C. Ray Nagin said yesterday that Katrina may have killed thousands in his city alone. Bloated bodies have been left to float idly in the floodwaters as aid workers and National Guard concentrate on assisting survivors. The danger of an outbreak of cholera and other waterborne diseases has now become critical. Nagin has called for a "total evacuation." "We have to. The city will not be functional for two or three months."
US President George W. Bush has returned to Washington after taking the opportunity to survey the devastation from his plane, Air Force One. The states of Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida have been declared disaster zones, underlining the fact that this is a crisis on a truly massive scale. "The folks on the Gulf Coast are going to need the help of this country for a long time. This is going to be a difficult road," he said. "The challenges we face on the ground are unprecedented." Soberly, Bush added, "This recovery will take a long time. This recovery will take years."
The US is better equipped than any other country to deal with the consequences of a natural disaster, but the military, police, aid agencies and authorities face a submerged and polluted uphill struggle of gargantuan proportions. Around 30,000 National Guard have been despatched to the crisis zone, accompanied by eight ships mobilized by the US Navy, bearing food and emergency supplies.
German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder has pledged his government's support for the US in their hour of need. He said that he had asked all his ministers to consider "what offers of help can be made to our American friends." Schröder expressed his personal condolences to President George W. Bush yesterday.
Evacuation underway
A top priority for the rescue operation is the evacuation of some 30,000 refugees encamped in the Superdome, the stadium used as a temporary shelter for those who had been unable to leave the city. Hundreds of stranded residents have made their way to the stadium over the past 48 hours, hoping for a ride out of the city and a hot meal. But instead they have been greeted by authorities unable to cope with the influx, and a stadium rapidly turning into an uninhabitable refuse dump.
The evacuation of the stadium has now begun. Refugees are to be gradually bussed to another, better equipped stadium, 350 miles away. The operation is being coordinated by the National Guard, under terms of strict secrecy. The fear is that pandemonium will break out in the arena once news of the move breaks out. Conditions in the stadium have become almost inhuman, with toilets overflowing, showers inoperable and airconditioning defunct. One man fell to his death from the stadium's rafters yesterday, when he took his own life after hearing his house had been destroyed. There were unconfirmed reports of a number of other deaths in the arena, of fights breaking in food lines, and even of children being raped.
Outrage over lawlessness
There has also been ill-disguised outrage at the lawlessness unleashed on the fetid streets on New Orleans. Mayor Nagin has ordered 1500 officers to cease their search and rescue duties and to concentrate on bringing order to the city. Until now, looting has threatened to transform the Big Easy into an aquatic free-for-all. Though there has been some sympathy for families left stranded in the metropolis and forced to fend for themselves, the looting has become more organized and vicious. Limited police resources have left law enforcement agencies largely helpless to tackle opportunistic thieves. Electrical stores have been raided and New Orleans' casinos have been targeted by gangs of looters. A police officer was shot when he tried to stop a group of looters, and more shockingly still, the ambulance later used to move the same officer to a different hospital was also shot at.
Governor Kathleen Blanco has confessed to her fury at the looting. "What angers me the most is disasters tend to bring out the best in everybody, and that's what we expected to see. Instead it brought out the worst." Homeowners and shopkeepers have been forced to defend their properties by force of arms, and there are unconfirmed reports of women being attacked and raped in the streets.
Tensions have been aggravated by a lack of information and advice on the ground. Relief efforts have been hampered by the understandable fears of truck drivers that their vehicles will be halted by desperate residents determined to get out of the city. A plan to send a fleet of buses into the city to aid the evacuation has been put on hold after drivers refused to travel without a state trooper on board to control the crowds.
Water level stable
In this putrid air of malaise and misery, it is only natural to look for a chink of light and optimism. Though 80 percent of the city now lies under water, the good news is that the waters are not expected to rise further. Lake Pontchartrain and the flood waters have reached a state of equilibrium. "The water isn't going to get higher," Colonel Terry Ebbert, director of homeland security for New Orleans told the New York Times
The news will be of little comfort to those who fear relatives and friends may have perished in the floods. Impromptu missing person sites have been established online, urging New Orleans residents to get in touch. Without electricity, mobile phone reception or a landline, there are likely to be thousands of survivors who are simply unable to get in touch with their families.
Once again, the blogger community has come into its own. With traditional journalists unable to access large parts of the city, personal blogs have become a valued source of information, enabling a more vivid understanding of the enormity of the crisis. Personal photo sites have also proved valuable; thousands of startling images now litter the Internet, testifying to the awesome power of Hurricane Katrina.
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