Hurricane Katrina: The Drive: New Orleans Lower 9th Ward

This has some impressive footage of the Lower 9th.

A letter to my very conservative uncle:
Hi Uncle John,
You asked me to write to you when my brother and I returned from New Orleans to tell you how it is. It's a mess!

David and I returned from Louisiana a week ago. We were supposed to go to Mississippi, but were re-routed at the last minute. We ended up staying in Arabi, Louisiana, which is in St. Bernard's Parish, right next to the lower 9th Ward. St. Bernard's Parish had 100% damage--every single structure in the county was damaged. Most still are.

In Arabi there are still no working traffic lights. There is no electricity, and there are no supermarkets. People walked 15 miles to come to the church we were staying at (Adullum Christian Fellowship in Arabi) for food, water, and clothing. There are some parts of the county that just recieved running water. Others still need to come to the church for bottled water.

On our first day at work, we put drywall up in the church. Most of the walls are still only drywall--or less. Each group had to have two volunteers to work in the "kitchen" each day, to feed the 100 volunteers (that week we had record numbers) and the 400 people who came every day for a hot lunch.

We spent the rest of the week gutting out the home of an elderly man and his son. His wife was in the hospital at the time of the hurricane, and her death is under investigation--they think the doctors euthanized her.

Anyway, I just wanted to tell you briefly about the trip. I hope everything is well with you and the family!
talk to you soon,
Kelly

Joe and Sid's Story:
Also found at: http://www.aliveintruth.org/stories/joe_n.htm, http://www.aliveintruth.org/stories/sid_joe.htm, http://www.aspca.org/site/PageServer?pagename=hurricane_photos_austin2

Joe and Sid have never evacuated before in their lives, but they promise they will every time from now on. They recieved a few feet of flooding from Hurricane Betsy, but nothing major since they've lived in St. Bernard's Parish all their lives, and live right down the block from the second layer of extra protective levees.

Joe is the son of Sid and Fran. He's a social studies teacher. On August 29th, Joe went outside to check on the storm--it was raining, but not too bad. He went out back to put the dogs in the kennel and soon he was picked up by a wave. He heard his neighbor's alarm go off, but the water busted down his door so fast that his alarm didn't have a chance to go off. He grabbed onto the gutter and grabbed his father. He had a pair of pants full of medications and his shotgun (he doesn't know why he grabbed his shotgun, he just did). He and Sid held onto the gutter until the water was high enough and they saw that one of their hunting dogs had escaped and had swam around the courner onto the roof. They followed. Sid grabbed one of their boats that had floated by and put it over Sid to cover him from the rain. A branch of the tree fell off and hit Joe's head into the boat, and he lost most of his teeth.

A man who had recently gotten out of jail for petty theft, had seen what was going on and stolen a boat. He then drove around the area picking up people like Joe and Sid. He took them around the block to a third story house, where they met 21 other people this man had saved. Three days later, a man came by saying that if they could swim to the ferry, they could get out safetly. Nine people were too old (like Sid) to do this so they and three people Joe's age stayed with them. The others swam to the ferry. The 12 people still on the roof remained there for seven days before they were rescued. During this time, Joe doggy-paddled past the house every day. He said the water was much warmer then he thought it would be, and it was full of coolers. Everyone had a cooler. When people came to finally rescue them, they put the sickest lady on the boat first and she was alive, but by the time they arrived at the ferry, she had died. Joe and Sid were put on a plane and told they were going to Arkansas, but when they arrived, they were in Austin, Texas. Once there, someone asked Joe what he did for a living, and he could not remember for a moment.

They have been waiting for Sid's trailer since it was promised in November. The orange placement markers were put up in March.

Fran had been wheelchair bound for quite some time. She was in Memorial Hospital when the storm struck. Her death is under inspection--her doctor may have euthenized her using morphene when the flood water started rising.