The fact that Black homeowners were more likely to face flooding than white homeowners wasn't an accident or bad luck. The Data Center, a New Orleans-based research organization, estimated that the storm and subsequent flooding displaced more than 1 million people, leaving hundreds of thousands of people homeless. Thornton remembers Compass telling him: Thats why I wanted to come over here and tell you so that you can get your families out.Thornton says Compass then told him he was taking his men out of the Superdome, before hugging him and saying he enjoyed working with him all these years. Everybody is scared.. Mouton suggested checking the water level every thirty minutes. They knew what that meant: The Superdome was now running on its backup generator, which could power the lights but not much more. An aerial view of the catastrophic flooding in Downtown New Orleans on August 31, 2005. Levees at various locations in the city had failed, and the pumping stations, overwhelmed with water and damaged by the storm, werent working. When the hurricane made landfall in southeast Louisiana on Aug. 29, 2005, its intensity had diminished but was still a major Category 3 storm. I was able to see how bad it was, even though it was night. 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. [8] Further damage included water damage to the electrical systems, and mold spread. National Geographic writes that the storm hit the coast of Louisiana on August 29 and ended up affecting up to 90,000 square miles of land and over 15 million people. This is not normal.. According to Talk Poverty, "a Black homeowner in New Orleans was more than three times as likely to have been flooded as a white homeowner. The roof was estimated to be able to withstand winds with speeds of up to 200mph (320km/h) and flood waters weren't expected to reach the second level 35 feet (11m) from the ground. And we look up and see a metal beam, a massive beam, that had been windblown into the aluminum siding. Sign up for the For The Win newsletter to get our top stories in your inbox every morning. [37] This was done as covertly as possible so as to not cause rioting or charges of favoritism. [14] With no power or clean water supply, sanitary conditions within the Superdome had rapidly deteriorated. [13][35] The attacker was later jailed. Light was fading fast. The backup generator for the lights was barely able to be kept afloat, and after the water supply gave out, the toilets "became inoperable and began to overflow." It was used as an emergency shelter although it was neither designed nor tested for the task. Hanging from her roof, a woman waits to be rescued by New Orleans Fire Department workers on August 29, 2005. A few of these groups wandered the concourse, stealing food and attacking anyone who stood up to them. On May 12, 2015, rubble remains at what used to be the B.W. We can't house people for five or six days. This is 40 or 50 feet up in the air. She came up with the list, talked to the dozens of people there, her husbands employees, people she knew a little bit before the storm and now knew like family. Some of those who left later returned, and by 2020 the population reached just over 390,000, or about 80 percent of its pre-Katrina population. At one point, the storm became a Category 5, but weakened before striking land. On August 27 Katrina strengthened to a category 3 hurricane, with top winds exceeding 115 miles (185 km) per hour and a circulation that covered virtually the entire Gulf of Mexico. The cost to repair the dome was initially stated by Superdome commission chairman Tim Coulon to be up to $400 million. Thornton held a status meeting at 5 p.m. with Lt. Col. Doug Mouton, an old friend who had arrived to take command of the 370 National Guard troops at the Superdome. - The total damage from Katrina is estimated to be $125 billion (or $190 billion in 2022 dollars), according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). It was already known that the generators would not provide lights or air conditioning for the whole dome if the power failed, and also pumps providing water to second-level restrooms wouldn't function. The total damage from Katrina is estimated to be $125 billion (or $190 billion in 2022 dollars), according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). A woman walks with a dog in the Lower Ninth Ward on May 16, 2015. 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. 2023 Cable News Network. All they could do was try to protect the generator. Many people living in the South Florida area were unaware when Katrina strengthened from a tropical storm to a hurricane in one day and struck southern Florida on August 25, 2005, near the Miami-Dade - Broward county line. On the flight out west, Thornton looked down and saw his home in Lakewood South, as well as the seven feet of water surrounding it. People try to get to higher ground as water rises on August 30, 2005, in New Orleans. Mouton then sent two diesel mechanics from the National Guard down to Thornton, and told them to invent a way to refuel the tank without opening the door that led to the outside. Governor Blanco herself stated, "They have M-16s, and they are locked and loaded. However, not a single one of those reports was "verified or substantiated. Over the next two days the weather system gathered strength, earning the designation Tropical Storm Katrina, and it made landfall between Miami and Fort Lauderdale, Florida, as a category 1 hurricanea storm that, on the Saffir-Simpson scale, exhibits winds in the range of 7495 miles (119154 km) per hour. However, there was no water purification equipment on site, nor any chemical toilets, antibiotics, or anti-diarrheals stored for a crisis. The Superdome was, as far as Thornton was concerned, completely destroyed. However, there weren't enough trucks for the patients, so they had to stay in the dome. [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. WATCH:I Was There: Hurricane Katrina Superdome Survivor. They write new content and verify and edit content received from contributors. The National Weather Service was revising its forecast again. During the recovery stage, the process wasn't much better. A refill was supposed to be on the way that day, but opening the door for the fuel truck would flood the room. It quickly intensified when it reached the warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico. Nearly half the fatalities in Louisiana were people over the age of 74. At 10 a.m., the Thorntons headed together to the Superdome. We took him to the terrace and said, Look. , As he saw the floodwaters rising around the stadium, the man broke down. Doug and Denise Thornton woke early to drive back to New Orleans. Nagin left office in 2010, and was later convicted on charges of bribery, fraud and money laundering committed while in office. Brown. Finally. When Hurricane Katrina first made landfall in Florida between Miami and Fort Lauderdale, it was a category 1 hurricane with sustained winds of 70 miles per hour. Thornton and Mouton climbed into a Humvee and drove toward the New Orleans Convention Center, dodging debris and navigating through a little standing water down Poydras Street. Despite the strength of Hurricane Katrina, there was little about the storm that made it intrinsically deadly. He didnt realize how bad things are other there, Wells said. Tulane University postponed its scheduled football game against the University of Southern Mississippi until November 26. 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 was an extremely destructive 2005 storm that caused more than 1,800 deaths along the U.S. Gulf Coast. Mayor of New Orleans Ray Nagin had stated that as a "refuge of last resort," only limited food, water, and supplies would be provided. And as Rob Nixon notes in "Slow Violence, Neoliberalism, and Environmental Picaresque," "Discrimination predates disaster: in failures to maintain protective structures, failures at pre-emergency hazard mitigation, failures to maintain infrastructure, failures to organize evacuation plans for those who lack private transport, all of which make the poor and racial minorities disproportionately vulnerable to catastrophe." Mahogany describes her actions before deciding to evacuate her home, her trip to the New Orleans Saints' Superdome, her horrific time at the Superdome, and finally her decision to leave New Orleans. As Katrina moved inland over Mississippi, it weakened to a Category 1 hurricane and later to a tropical storm. We pee on the floor. For detailed information on the effect on Tulane, see, Effect of Hurricane Katrina on the Louisiana Superdome, Effects of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans, "Effect of Hurricane Katrina on the Louisiana Superdome", Learn how and when to remove this template message, Effect of Hurricane Katrina on the New Orleans Saints, Effect of Hurricane Katrina on Tulane University, Effect of Hurricane Katrina on the New Orleans Hornets, "How New Orleans' Evacuation Plan Fell Apart", "Hurricane Katrina as Seen Through the Eyes of the Saints' Biggest Fans", "At least 10,000 find refuge at the Superdome", "Governor: Evac Superdome, Rescue Centers", "Trapped in the Superdome: Refuge becomes a hellhole", "Photo in the News: Hurricane Shreds Superdome Roof", "NFL 2005: Homeless Saints face long road in 2005", "Almost 10 years after Katrina, Michael Brown's still out to lunch: Jarvis DeBerry", "Refuge of last resort: Five days inside the Superdome for Hurricane Katrina", "From Superdome to Astrodome: Katrina's refugees will be moved to Houston in bus convoy", "Superdome evacuation disrupted after shots fired", "10 Years Since Katrina: When The Astrodome Was A Mass Shelter", "Astrodome to become new home for storm refugees", "Astrodome at capacity, but buses with evacuees keep coming", "Neighbouring states struggle to cope with influx of people", "Dome closed for a year, could be scrapped", "NFL, at Saints' urging, kicks in $20 million for dome repairs", "Superdome returns with glitz, glamor and Monday night football", "Katrina Takes a Toll on Truth, News Accuracy", "Reports of anarchy at Superdome overstated", "Higher Death Toll Seen; Police Ordered to Stop Looters", "7 facts about Hurricane Katrina that show just how incompetent the government response was", "Four years on, Katrina remains cursed by rumour, cliche, lies and racism", "Saints' home games: 4 at LSU, 3 in Alamodome", "Errors cost Saints early, often in poor excuse for 'home' opener", "32nd annual Bayou Classic moved to Houston", "SOUTHERN JAGUARS FALL 50-35 TO GRAMBLING STATE IN BAYOU CLASSIC XXXII", Temporary home venues in 2005 due to Hurricane Katrina, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Effect_of_Hurricane_Katrina_on_the_Louisiana_Superdome&oldid=1113156691, Articles needing additional references from October 2014, All articles needing additional references, Wikipedia introduction cleanup from February 2022, Articles covered by WikiProject Wikify from February 2022, All articles covered by WikiProject Wikify, Articles with unsourced statements from January 2016, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, This page was last edited on 30 September 2022, at 02:13. The men sat in stunned silence. Police watch over prisoners from Orleans Parish Prison who were evacuated to a highway on September 1, 2005. We wont be able to feed these folks. At their peak, hurricane relief shelters housed 273,000 people. ", Ultimately, it's unknown exactly what the death toll of Hurricane Katrina was. The 2005 hurricane and subsequent levee failures led to death and destructionand dealt a lasting blow to leadership and the Gulf region. On Wednesday morning, Mouton and Thornton checked the water first thing. Michael Appleton/NY Daily News Archive/Getty Images. [30][31], As of August 31, there had been three deaths in the Superdome: two elderly medical patients who were suffering from existing illness, and a man who committed suicide by jumping from the upper level seats. However, National Hurricane Center (NHC) forecasts had correctly predicted the strengthening, and hurricane watches and warnings . A group of Amish student volunteers tour the Lower Ninth Ward on February 24, 2006. Before Hurricane Katrina, B.W. The Superdome was gone. On May 16, 2015, new homes stand in a development, built by the Make It Right Foundation, for residents whose homes were destroyed. NOAA report- Direct deaths: 520 - Indirect deaths: 565 - Indeterminate cause: 307- Total number of fatalities: 1392. No electricity in New Orleans meant no air conditioning in the dome, filling it with a horrible, muggy heat. This was it. After levees and flood walls protecting New Orleans failed, much of the city was underwater. With maximum sustained winds of 175 mph, the storm killed a total of 1,833 people and left millions homeless in New Orleans and along the Gulf Coast of Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama. Hurricane Katrina made landfall off the coast of Louisiana on August 29, 2005. Cooper held about 1,000 families and was the city's largest housing project. The White House writes that by February 2006, there were still over 2,000 people who were counted as missing, and many are still missing over 15 years after the storm. Several hundredof Thorntons part-time employees had shown up as well, unable to evacuate, and hed placed them in one of the club lounges along with the families of some New Orleans Police Department officers. As Talk Poverty notes, it was directly due to "racially discriminatory housing practices," which meant that"the high-ground was taken by the time banks started loaning money to African Americans who wanted to buy a home.". Blood and feces covered the walls of the facility. "[2], Despite these previous periods of emergency use, as Katrina approached the city, officials had not stockpiled enough generator fuel, food, and other supplies to handle the needs of the thousands of people seeking refuge there. They guarded the office where Thornton and his team huddled, but that was about it. All sources confirm deaths, although the numbers of the dead vary. [42] Their first "home" game was played on September 19, 2005 against the New York Giants at Giants Stadium, which resulted in a 2710 loss. [36] A group of about 100 tourists were "smuggled" out from the Superdome to the New Orleans Arena next door, where 800 medical needs patients were being held. Robert Fontaine walks past a burning house fire in New Orleans' Seventh Ward on September 6, 2005. The NOPD was gone. Governor Blanco's comment regarding M-16s was likely in response to the reports of snipers shooting at police and rescue workers. The Social Science Research Council writes that this disparity occurred because elderly people were neither evacuated nor protected effectively. In the bathrooms, every toilet had ceased to function. [52] The Mountaineers won, 3835. At 5 a.m. on August 29, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which administered the levees, received a report that water had broken through the concrete flood wall between the 17th Street Canal and the city. Prior to Hurricane Katrina, the public school system of New Orleans was one of the lowest-performing districts in the state of Louisiana. Although up to 1.7 million people were evacuated in Louisiana alone, hundreds of thousands of people were stranded during the hurricane. Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast on August 29, 2005. They mulled it over. [15] Evacuees began to break into the luxury suites, concession stands, vending machines, and offices to look for food and other supplies. But that was the only light they could see. A few hours later, at 9:00 AM EDT, reports from inside the dome were that part of the roof was "peeling off" in the violent winds. In April 2000, according to the Data Center, the population of New Orleans was 484,674; by July 2006, not quite a year after Katrina, it had dropped by more than 250,000, to some 230,172. [29] However, the eventual cost to renovate and repair the dome was roughly $185 million and it was reopened for the Saints' first home game in the city in September 2006. The Louisiana Superdome was used as a "shelter of last resort" for those in New Orleans unable to evacuate from the city when Hurricane Katrina struck on August 29, 2005. All Rights Reserved. But the day before the hurricane hit, with the roads jammed with the vehicles of a million fleeing residents, the city of New Orleans decided to house people in the Superdome temporarily. Tempers began to flare as hunger and thirst deepened. President Bush was otherwise occupied during this time. The day . According to PBS, two weeks after the storm, 25% of the children remained unaccounted for. By 2007, 99% of the 1.2 million personal property claims had been settled by insurers. 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. The generator was near ground level behind the Superdome, and water was pushing against its exterior door. 70% of New Orleans occupied housing, 134,000 units, were damaged in the storm. [34] However, after a National Guardsman was attacked with a metal rod, the National Guard put up barbed wire barricades to separate and protect themselves from the other people in the dome, and blocked people from exiting. They worked furiously. A neighborhood east of downtown New Orleans remains flooded on August 30, 2005. There were no designated medical staff at work in the evacuation center, no established sick bay within the Superdome, and very few cots available that hadn't been brought in by evacuees. And according to Vox, when the Louisiana National Guard asked FEMA for 700 buses to help with the evacuation, only 100 were sent in response. [49][50] Grambling State University beat Southern University, 5035.[51]. If it rose, theyd evacuate. The moonlight was shining on the water., She paused. Itll be harder to manage them. Meanwhile, NOLA.com reports that New Orleans police officers were given authorization to shoot looters. Thornton felt the seconds ticking, each one more dangerous than the last. The men sat in stunned silence. That night, around 6 p.m., Thornton got a phone call. Feces covered the walls of bathrooms. Meanwhile, in the Senate committee report, race isn't mentioned once in over 700 pages. Whatever they needed was theirs. Many of them boarded without having any idea of where they were headed. Although they were meant to be used for 18 months, they were still in use up to six years after the hurricane. The food inside the freezers had soon rotted, and "the smell was inescapable.". Daylight could be seen from inside the dome, and rain was pouring in. Corrections? The Industrial Canal was later breached as well, flooding the neighborhood known as the Lower Ninth Ward. "Hurricane Katrina survivors in the Superdome." . One crisis had been averted. Deaths in the Superdome. People seek high ground on Interstate 90 as a helicopter prepares to land at the Superdome in New Orleans on August 31, 2005. The chief of police had been given bad information. Rather, the hurricane was named in accordance with the World Meteorological Organizations lists of hurricane names, which rotate every six years. If we had evacuated who knows what wouldve happened Thornton said. The smell of the air became humid, tropical. 23 Most of these pieces show the Superdome's population rising by at least 10,000, swelling to as many 25,000. Ten years ago this weekend, Hurricane Katrina roared ashore on the Gulf Coast, killing more than 1,000 people (the true death toll may never be known). On the morning of August 29, 2005, Katrina made landfall around 60 miles southeast of New Orleans. In the United States, Louisiana has the "highest rate of beds per 1,000 persons ages 85 or more," but over half of the nursing homes in New Orleans decided against early evacuation. Ive been in there seven days, and I havent had a bath. They found the building in better shape than the Superdome fewer windows were blown out and the building, unlike the Superdome, had a roof. Hurricane Katrina, the tropical cyclone that struck the Gulf Coast in August 2005, was the third-strongest hurricane to hit the United States in its history at the time. Security checks were conducted, and people with medical illnesses or disabilities were moved to one side of the dome with supplies and medical personnel. 2008 Dec;2(4):215-23. doi: 10.1097/DMP.0b013e31818aaf55. By some estimates, between 80 and 90 percent of New Orleans population was able to evacuate the city prior to Katrina. Winds of 125 mph and storm surges of 28 feet devastated much of Biloxi and Gulfport, Mississippi. Some 25,000 crowded into the convention center, while more than 25,000 filled the Superdome. We cant spare 6 feet.. With limited power, no plumbing, a shredded roof and not nearly enough supplies to deal with 30,000 evacuees, it became a symbol of how unprepared the city and country had been for a storm experts knew could arrive. Houses stand in the Seventh Ward on May 12, 2015. 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.". People search for their belongings among debris washed up on the beach in Biloxi on August 30, 2005. The Society Pages writes that there were six deaths in the Superdome: one by suicide, one by overdose, and four from natural causes. This is a nuthouse, said April Thomas, 42, there with her 11 children.
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