Two Years ago this week, Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast. After watching it grow in the Bahamas and head west, I had a feeling this one would be different. It became a category 3 by the time it passed Florida. And it had grown to the size of entire Gulf of Mexico, becoming a category 5—the largest and strongest rating of a hurricane. Katrina slammed into Biloxi, Bridgeport, and New Orleans with 175 mph winds and massive storm surges. As trees, power lines and buildings were torn from their foundations, it was evident that a lot of damage was done. But reports got worse.
Reports came out that many in urban areas could not be evacuated on time. Thousands of people were forced to wait out the storm. But as the storm passed, we found the worst was not yet over. The shear force of the storm surges had caused the New Orleans Levees to crumble, flooding many low level areas including the notoriously under franchised 9th ward. Many scrambled for shelter. Thousands were put up in emergency housing in the Super Dome. Gas lines burst, causing the polluted waters of the Mississippi River to erupt into flames. People hit the flooded streets looking for whatever supplies they could find.
All the while, President Bush and his key advisers continued their vacation in Crawford, Texas. The National Guard began to react and FEMA moved in. Emergency rations were air dropped. Bodies began to surface in the waters. People, stranded on flooded houses were rescued by helicopters. Reports that National Guard Members were being shot at were given, then denied, then confirmed, then denied. No body knew what was going on. Then reports came out that public buses had been in storage during the evacuation procedures. Literally hundreds of thousands of citizens could have been rescued before the event if the appropriate actions could have been made.
The conditions in the Super Dome had been reduced to squalor only seen in war torn third world nations. Panic in the streets of New Orleans. Rescue crews had to fight fires in filthy, polluted water. Survivors were collecting the dead—over 1700 in all. It took President Bush and his advisers a week to finally get to the Gulf Coast—first to console Sen. Trent Lott on the loss of his historic plantation house, and then to the deadly waters of New Orleans.
Less then a month later, just as the waters began to drop, the unthinkable happened. Another category 5 hurricane--Rita—followed the almost exact route as Katrina, once again slamming into the gulf coast. I will never forget the sight of the entire 9th ward, once again flooded by the waters of the Mississippi. Original evacuees who had returned were forced to evacuate. Those living in the Super Dome and other emergency facilities were forced to ride the storm again.
I have been to the Gulf Coast since then. As have thousands of others. Many are working with little to no experience on how to rebuild a city. Millions of volunteer hours have been put into the reconstruction of the area. But it is slow and awkward. In Biloxi-Bridgeport, the storm ravaged coast line is still a ghost town, except for a bustling downtown of casinos. Casinos and no infrastructure. Trees still slant at an awkward 45 degree angle. Empty concrete slabs lie dormant with neon signs missing logos but still recognizable. That one was a Waffle House. That one was a Taco Bell. That one, a Texaco.
As for New Orleans, I have no doubt that it is the most visible and tangible recognition of race and class difference in the United States. The down town infrastructure has been completely on the mend. The lightly hit French Quarter—predominantly white and upper class-- is back to 100%. But the predominantly poor Upper and Lower Ninth Wards are still abandoned. Homes have been stripped to the studs. And volunteers work daily to tend empty plots of land. High grasses are prime spots for snakes, parasites and disease carrying vermin. Workers often don’t last more than a couple of weeks due to burnout and exhaustion. And the poisonous mold spores left over after the floods cause chronic coughing and fatigue. Homes still have the tell-tale graffiti left by the National Guard Search and Rescue crews. This house had poisonous water in it and was never searched. This one had an abandoned dog in it. This one had two bodies in it. This one burned down.
Two years later and recovery is still slow. People have been forced out of their homes and communities and have been scattered across the country. A Diaspora of Gulf Coast natives and a government slow to act.
In other news, did you see that Alberto Gonzales resigned on Friday? And it isn’t even my birthday.
