It damaged more than a million housing units in the region. People wade through high water in front of the Superdome in New Orleans on August 30, 2005. They would back the fuel resupply truck up to the door, smash a hole in the wall, and run a line directly from the truck to the generator. The moonlight was shining on the water., She paused. That night, around 6 p.m., Thornton got a phone call. According to NBC News, the average age of victims was 69, and "just under half of all victims were 75 or older." Experts don't know exactly how many people lost their lives during Hurricane Katrina, but 1,800 is one of the low estimates, and over 1 million people lost their homes and were displaced. In the bathrooms, every toilet had ceased to function. She knew the destruction was bad, that water was everywhere. [17][18] 25,000 evacuees were taken to the Astrodome in Houston, while another 25,000 were taken to San Antonio and Dallas. The men sat in stunned silence. [citation needed] Residents who evacuated to the Superdome were warned to bring their own supplies with them. The New Orleans Saints played four of their scheduled home games at LSU's Tiger Stadium in Baton Rouge, three at the Alamodome in San Antonio, and one at Giants Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey. This is a national emergency. [5] Maj. Gen. Bennett C. Landreneau of the Louisiana National Guard, said that the number of people taking shelter in the Superdome rose to around 15,00020,000 as search and rescue teams brought more people from areas hit hard by the flooding.[6]. https://ftw.usatoday.com/2015/08/refuge-of-last-resort-five-days-inside-the-superdome-for-hurricane-katrina, Your California Privacy Rights/Privacy Policy. This death was one of only six deaths at the Superdome: one person overdosed and four others died of natural causes. A school bus drops off a student in front of the Claiborne Bridge on May 12, 2015. Weve been here since 6 a.m., and this is getting worse and worse, State Police Officer K.W. A violent, free-for-all riot seemed sure to break out with the next bit of bad news. And since the hurricane evacuation plan stipulated that "the primary means of hurricane evacuation will be personal vehicles," according to "Hurricane Katrina: A Nation Still Unprepared" (the Senate committee's report), this left the state's most impoverished and vulnerable families, the large majority of whom were people of color, without anywhere to go as Hurricane Katrina hit. Local legend has it the 73,000-seat stadium was built atop a cemetery, cursing the football team that calls it home the Saints to an eternity as cellar-dwellers. Hurricane Katrina caused up to $161 billion worth of damage, largely due to the fact that the breached levees led to flooding in 80% of New Orleans. Sign up for the For The Win newsletter to get our top stories in your inbox every morning. . Katrina victim who died in wheelchair honored - NBC News Between 20,000 and 30,000 people in New Orleans were evacuated to the Mercedes-Benz Superdome. Although most of these shootings led to criminal prosecutions, "several of the officers involved have avoided prison or [were] still awaiting a final resolution of their cases" up to a decade after the storm. Hurricane Katrina was a devastating Category 5 Atlantic hurricane that resulted in 1,392 fatalities and caused damage estimated between $97.4 billion to $145.5 billion in late August 2005, particularly in the city of New Orleans and its surrounding areas. Doug dropped his wife off at their home in the affluent Lakewood South neighborhood of New Orleans, right near the levee at the 17th Street Canal, and drove to the Louisiana Superdome. The guardsmans gun went off during the confrontation. "Hurricane Katrina survivors in the Superdome." . By then it was too late for Thornton to call in the staff hed need to keep it running. 2005 Hurricane Katrina: Facts, FAQs, and how to help Thornton finally spoke. FEMA photo/Andrea Booher. Roughly 14,000 people were inside now. Thousands were looking for a place to go after leaving the Superdome shelter. Up to 47% "were caused by acute and chronic diseases." This place wont be here in six days.. It took two days for 1,000 more FEMA officials to arrive, but once they did, FEMA "slowed the evacuation with unworkable paperwork and certification requirements." Some trapped inside also believe the curse is real. Ive been through a lot of hurricanes. katrina Why Did Hurricane Katrina Kt Women So Hard? The Evacuation of Older People: The Case of Hurricane Katrina He made two requests: Hed need a large contingent of National Guardsmen, and a few hours Sunday morning to prepare. June 2006 - The Government Accountability Office releases a report that concludes at least $1 billion in disaster relief payments made by FEMA were improper and potentially fraudulent. Katrina made landfall that morning as a Category 4 storm with sustained winds in excess of 135 mph. By late afternoon, the breaching of the London Avenue Canal levees had left 80 percent of New Orleans underwater. As a result, according to ESRI, most minority communities ended up living in neighborhoods that were cheaply built and in areas more susceptible to flooding. Doug Thornton knew he had to get his people out. These troops know how to shoot and kill and they are more than willing to do so if necessary. Only after Katrina passed were people going to be bussed to shelters. Thornton and Mouton unleashed days worth of frustration. Early the next morning Thorntonwoke from a fitful sleep, then went out into the hallway outside his office. The men sat in stunned silence. A woman walks with a dog in the Lower Ninth Ward on May 16, 2015. The National Flood Insurance Program paid out $16 billion in claims. Refuge of last resort: Five days inside the Superdome for Hurricane Katrina Then the women and the children. Out of 60 nursing homes in New Orleans, 21 had evacuated their residents in advance of Katrina. Levees at various locations in the city had failed, and the pumping stations, overwhelmed with water and damaged by the storm, werent working. At 7 am Katrina is a Category 5 with 160 mph maximum sustained winds. A woman slumped over in a wheelchair in a back corner, a At least 1,833 died in the hurricane and subsequent floods. And,. estimated population had increased to 376,971. By the time the storm strengthened to a category 3 hurricane, winds exceeded 115 miles per hour. They guarded the office where Thornton and his team huddled, but that was about it. For now, theyd monitor. Security checks were conducted, and people with medical illnesses or disabilities were moved to one side of the dome with supplies and medical personnel. He needed to start getting people out. President Bush was otherwise occupied during this time. The dome's emergency generator was able to power the internal lighting but little else; the building's air conditioning system would no longer operate, nor would the refrigeration system which was keeping food from spoiling. In addition, according to the journalSocial Science & Medicine, there were also long-term mental health consequences of Hurricane Katrina. Sustained winds of 70 miles (115 km) per hour lashed the Florida peninsula, and rainfall totals of 5 inches (13 cm) were reported in some areas. Heres a look at some statistics from Hurricane Katrina. The Bayou Classic was moved from the Superdome to Reliant Stadium in Houston. It was the costliest natural disaster in U.S. history. Authors . Crack vials littered the bathrooms. Thats been the history. In many ways, the horrors of Hurricane Katrina were also exaggerated and in turn led to additional tragedies, such as the police shootings of unarmed residents and subsequent cover-up on Danziger Bridge. The office asked him if he could open up the Superdome as a refuge of last resort for the city of New Orleans. Then, one of the mechanicshad an idea: Bypass the tank altogether. 24 With scant food and water sources, . Supplies were dangerously low, with one mother saying officials told her to reuse diapers by scraping them out when they got dirty. The line to get in was already a quarter-mile long. And cars were overturned on Poydras Street.. It ran into the reserve tank. Out of the at least 1,800 deaths caused by Hurricane Katrina, nearly half were elderly people. Later that day, Louisiana Governor Kathleen Blanco ordered New Orleans to be completely evacuated. Thornton, pacing inside, turned to one of the mechanics. It continued on a course to the northeast, crossing the Mississippi Sound and making a second landfall later that morning near the mouth of the Pearl River. After levees and flood walls protecting New Orleans failed, much of the city was underwater. The 2006 Sugar Bowl, which pitted the University of Georgia Bulldogs against the West Virginia University Mountaineers, was moved from the Superdome to the Georgia Dome in Atlanta. CNN Sans & 2016 Cable News Network. It wasnt until midnight that things started to settle down. By some estimates, between 80 and 90 percent of New Orleans population was able to evacuate the city prior to Katrina. After levees and flood walls protecting New Orleans failed, much of the city was underwater. All Rights Reserved. Thornton, whod been cooped up in the Superdome for going on five days, looked down on her city, at the soft waves lapping against the houses in the moonlight. Thousands more were unable to evacuate, including the nearly 25,000 who sheltered in the Superdome. Thornton recruited off-duty NOPD officers to come grab sandbags and carry them from the parking lot, through the loading dock, and back to the generator room from the inside. The skies darkened, and the wind started to pick up. Residents of Saucier, Mississippi, line up to get gas on August 31, 2005. By 7 p.m. everyone was inside and had been checked. However, tens of thousands of residents could not or would not leave. Although Louisiana and Mississippi were most heavily affected, Alabama, Florida, and Georgia also suffered casualties due to the disaster. He flew on to Gonzales, where his wife was waiting for him. [7] Medical machines also failed, which prompted a decision to move patients to the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center. By 11 a.m. on August 30, Katrina had dwindled to heavy rainfall and winds of about 35 mph. Meanwhile, NOLA.com reports that New Orleans police officers were given authorization to shoot looters. While Mouton and Thornton worked to find space for them to operate, two massive, 18-wheeler refrigerated trucks pulled into the loading dock, not far from the door where new arrivals entered the building. A man pushes his bicycle through flood waters near the Superdome in New Orleans on Aug. 31, 2005. The storm initially formed as a tropical depression southeast of the Bahamas on August 23. We are like animals, Taffany Smith, 25, told the Los Angeles Times, while she gripped her 3-week-old son in her arms. The storm was coming. Governor Blanco's comment regarding M-16s was likely in response to the reports of snipers shooting at police and rescue workers. New Orleans went from having a public school system to having a school system composed almost entirely of charter schools, most of them run by charter management organizations. To see all these downtown buildings completely shut down, Thornton said. This is a nuthouse, said April Thomas, 42, there with her 11 children. On the state and local level, Louisiana Gov. A storm worth worrying about had entered the gulf. They knew what that meant: The Superdome was now running on its backup generator, which could power the lights but not much more. Some 25,000 crowded into the convention center, while more than 25,000 filled the Superdome. Hurricane Katrina and the Demographics of Death I would rather have been in jail, Janice Jones said while being taken out of the dome. Many local agencies found themselves unable to respond to the increasingly desperate situation, as their own headquarters and control centres were under 20 feet (6 metres) of water. The hurricane and its aftermath claimed more than 1,800 lives, and it ranked as the costliest natural disaster in U.S. history. The air conditioning ducts would have mold in them by now. Hurricane Katrina Superdome New Orleans National Guard Hurricane Katrina was a tropical cyclone that struck the southeastern United States in late August 2005. Brown. In addition, a Bleacher Report article quotes Thornton saying "We're not a hospital. At least 1,833 died in the hurricane and. by Laura Butterbaugh Thanks to the Internet, the images of the victims of Hurricane Katrina were as vivid as they were shocking: A hysterical woman pleading to TV cameras that women and girls were being raped in the Superdome. 25% were caused by injury and trauma and 11% were caused by heart conditions. Nagin left office in 2010, and was later convicted on charges of bribery, fraud and money laundering committed while in office. Hurricane Katrina survivors arrive at the Houston Astrodome Red Cross Shelter after being evacuated from New Orleans. Everybody is scared.. At one point, a desperate man, who had all the belongings he had brought to the Superdome stolen, tried to escape and had to be calmed by National Guardsmen. NOLA.com reports that FEMA also "turned away offers of personnel and supplies from the Department of Interior and denied a request from the state Wildlife & Fisheries agency for 300 rubber boats.". That night a National Guardsmangot jumped as he walked through a dark, flooded locker room. It had barely risen at all maybe an inch. As general manager of the facility since 1997, he had been through this several times before. We've received your submission. As a result, thousands of people became stranded at the Superdome, while thousands more ended up on the roofs of their homes as floodwaters reached heights of 20 feet. [32] New Orleans Police Department chief Eddie Compass appeared on The Oprah Winfrey Show and reported seeing "little babies getting raped" and New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin also said he saw hooligans raping and killing people. The 2005 New Orleans Bowl between the University of Southern Mississippi and Arkansas State University was moved from the Superdome to Cajun Field in Lafayette. They would later learnwhat had happened: Levees at various locations in and around the city had failed, and the pumping stations, overwhelmed with water and damaged by the storm, werent working. Thornton and Mouton found this odd, but figured the drains in the city had been backed up. The Washington Post reports that not only did the Corps cut costs and pinch pennies in order to save money in the short term, but the engineering of the levees was "a disjointed fashion based on outdated data" (via Vox). Hurricane Katrina | New Orleans History The population of New Orleans fell from 484,674 in April 2000 to 230,172 in July 2006, a decrease of over 50%. By 2021, the estimated population had increased to 376,971, according to the Census. Hurricane Katrina reached Category 5 strength in the Gulf Coast, and although it was a Category 3 when it made landfall, it was still one of the "worst disasters in U.S. history," according to World Vision. Never did we think wed be here for nearly a week.. As Katrina moved inland over Mississippi, it weakened to a Category 1 hurricane and later to a tropical storm. Although up to 1.7 million people were evacuated in Louisiana alone, hundreds of thousands of people were stranded during the hurricane.