Hard Times for ‘The Big Easy’

Just eight months after the Asian tsunami, the world is

again humbled by the power of nature. This event,
however, makes us ask new questions ……. about
human nature and American society.

VV ’05
 The Location of New Orleans

Mississippi River

Florida

Gulf of Mexico

New Orleans is in the state of Louisiana. It is located on the delta of the

Mississippi River about 170km from its mouth on the Gulf of Mexico
 Lake
Pontchartrin
Mississippi
River

Gulf of
Mexico
Mississippi Delta
 Lake Pontchartrin

Mississippi River
 New Orleans : some facts

• A city of 470,000 people (67% Afro American)

• Founded by the French in 1718
• Expanded by the Spaniards
• Bought by the USA for $15 million in 1803
• A lively port and industrial city
• Home of jazz and cajun and creole cooking
• Hosts an annual mardi gras carnival
• Attracts hundreds of thousands of tourists
every year
 New Orleans lies in a basin below sea level
so it has always been vulnerable to flooding

New Orleans is protected from flooding by levées

But in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina which swept by on
29 August, the levées broke and the city was flooded………
Two days before, the people of New Orleans had watched
and waited as Hurricane Katrina approached…….
 People who
had transport
fled the city

Shop keepers
boarded up
their windows

Volunteers
helped to fill
sandbags
South of New Orleans on the Gulf coast
180 km winds cause huge damage
 Downtown
New Orleans
at the height
of the storm
on 29 August

The eye of the

hurricane passed
to the east of the
city
After the
storm…..

It seemed New Orleans had got off

more lightly than expected…
until the levées broke and water
flooded into the city…………
Within 24 hours 80% of the city was under water
Streets turned into canals
The rising waters flooded the French Quarter
Affluent housing sinking beneath the rising tide
Public transport is out of action
 With roads
flooded, only
the motorway
fly-overs are
high enough
to rise above
the water

…but they are going

no where!
Many people drown – Government
estimates warn of several thousand dead
 One hundred
thousand people
who were not able to
leave the city….

…are trapped in
their homes.

Most of these had simply

been too poor to flee
Most are desperate to be rescued
 The water is
polluted with
sewage and oil

….but people are

forced into it in
order to survive
Food and drinking water becomes scarce within
hours and is only flown in two days later
Hospitals evacuate patients by boat
As the story unfolds on TV screens
across the globe, the American
government seems slow to
respond to the scale of the disaster
The police struggle to contain a rising tide of lawlessness
A slow evacuation begins
Some emergency relief
begins to arrive in the
city
Helicopters begin to airlift some of the stranded to safety
But with no means of evacuation, conditions continue to
deteriorate for most of those still trapped in the city
23,000 people take refuge in the New Orleans Superbowl
without running water and adequate sanitation. Reports
likened conditions to ‘a Third World refugee camp’
People remain very fearful
Four days after the storm US President George
Bush flies over the city to view the catastrophe
first hand …….

“The enormity of the task requires more resources”

“In America we do not abandon our fellow citizens in
their hour of need”
“Where our response is not working we will make it right.
Where our response is working, we will duplicate it”
“The main priority is to restore and maintain law and
order and assist in recovery and evacuation.”
More helicopters are drafted in to help with the
evacuation of the city
Convoys of buses evacuate people from the
Convention centre in New Orleans
Six days after the storm, the city is almost empty
The waters are
slowly receding…

And the grim task

of searching
buildings must
begin.
 “The first few days were a
natural disaster, the last four
days were a man-made
disaster”   

Phillip Holt, 51
New Orleans evacuee

Photograph credits – ‘Der Spiegel’