Hundreds Feared Dead on Storm-Ravaged US Coast
Date: 31-Aug-05
Country: USA
Author: Rick Wilking
Authorities made plans to remove thousands of storm refugees from the Superdome stadium and other shelters in New Orleans, most of which was flooded when sections of its protective levee system collapsed overnight and allowed water from Lake Pontchartrain to swamp the streets.
The US military planned to use helicopters to drop giant sandbags filled with gravel into the breach. Authorities were also considering plugging the gap with shipping containers filled with sand.
The economic cost of the hurricane's devastating blow could be the highest in US history, as much as $26 billion, according to risk analysts' estimates.
"The dimensions are unfathomable," Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco said. She advised residents to hold a day of prayer Wednesday to "calm our spirits" and give thanks for survival.
In the Mississippi coastal city of Biloxi, hundreds may have died after being trapped in their homes when a 30-foot storm surge came ashore, a city spokesman said. Cadaver dogs were being brought in to help find the dead.
"It's going to be in the hundreds," spokesman Vincent Creel told Reuters. Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour had said there were reports of up to 80 dead in the Biloxi area, but US Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said the state's unofficial estimates were "probably way too low."
Biloxi Fire Captain Michael Thomas said an entire apartment complex collapsed and officials believed there are many bodies in the building. At a nearby cemetery, coffins drifted out of mausoleums. "Caskets are everywhere," he said.
Looters casually picked through goods and ignored the shouts of firefighters on rescue duty, who recorded the activities on videotape.
Rescuers struggled through high water and mountains of debris to reach areas crushed by Katrina when it struck the Gulf Coast Monday. The storm inflicted catastrophic damage as it slammed into Louisiana with 140 mph winds, then raged into Mississippi, Alabama and Tennessee.
Most of the deaths appear to have been caused by the storm surge, which swept as far as a mile inland in parts of Mississippi.
In Biloxi's Point Cadet, not a house was standing, all reduced to piles of rubble. Natural-gas lines spewed into the air and boats rested on debris.
At a seafront hotel, a 30-foot tree trunk pierced a brick wall. A memorial to the US military on the seafront walk was destroyed, its 10-foot granite blocks tossed around like a child's toy.
"It was like our tsunami," Creel said.
Louisiana Democratic Sen. Mary Landrieu said after an aerial inspection, "there are places that are no longer there."
Across the region, hundreds of people climbed onto rooftops to escape rising water that lapped at the eaves. They used axes, and in at least one case a shotgun, to blast holes in roofs so they could escape through the attics.
PLUCKED TO SAFETY
Police took boats into flooded areas to rescue some of the stranded and others were plucked off rooftops by helicopter. The Coast Guard helped rescue 1,200 in New Orleans Monday night and thousands more all along the Gulf Coast Tuesday.
"We've been pulling them off sometimes four at a time, sometimes as many as 12," said Coast Guard Petty Officer Larry Chambers. "People are being taken to the nearest dry spot then the helicopter's going back and picking up more people."
New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin reported bodies floating in the city's floodwaters, which may have measured 20 feet deep in places.
New Orleans is a bowl-like city mostly below sea level and protected by levees or embankments. The levees gave way overnight in places, including a 200-foot breach that allowed the lake waters to pour into the city center.
Blanco said a plan was being developed to evacuate the Superdome, which had no electricity, and other shelters.
"The first goal is to bring enough supplies in to sustain those folks until we can develop a network to get them out," she
