But over the Gulf of Mexico, some 165 miles west of Key West, the storm gathered strength above the warmer waters of the gulf. Doug and Denise Thornton woke early to drive back to New Orleans. One crisis had been averted. As a result, the rumors of lawlessness in New Orleans actually made things much worse for stranded survivors. [37] This was done as covertly as possible so as to not cause rioting or charges of favoritism. The storm initially formed as a tropical depression southeast of the Bahamas on August 23. The Superdome with the newly repaired roof, August 15, 2006. Do you think this is going to work? he asked. New homes stand along the rebuilt Industrial Canal levee on May 16, 2015. Two men paddle through the streets past the Claiborne Bridge in New Orleans on August 31, 2005. A bustling black market has also emerged, with cigarettes, at $10 a pack, and anti-diuretics, which help forestall going to the bathroom, hot items. Hurricane Katrina had intruded on the last safe place. Engineers also didn't consider sinking land and soil quality, which led to a misjudgment of soil stability. Sept. 1, 2006, 3:09 PM PDT / Source: The Associated Press. Everybody is scared.. This is a national disgrace, he said. His home was destroyed. But now, in the moonlight, she finally understood what had happened. Updates? It was worse than they imagined.. The generator was near ground level behind the Superdome, and water was pushing against its exterior door. Families torn apart by the storm wouldnt re-connect for months in some cases. Police watch over prisoners from Orleans Parish Prison who were evacuated to a highway on September 1, 2005. A refill was supposed to be on the way that day, but opening the door for the fuel truck would flood the room. Initially, the Superdome was described as a "lawless, depraved, and chaotic" place, with reports of numerous murders. Later, approximately 114,000 households were housed in FEMA trailers. But Thornton wasnt thinking about that right then. Did you encounter any technical issues? As far as natural disasters go, Hurricane Katrina was a bad one. They guarded the office where Thornton and his team huddled, but that was about it. Between 20,000 and 30,000 people in New Orleans were evacuated to the Mercedes-Benz Superdome. According to PBS, two weeks after the storm, 25% of the children remained unaccounted for. Theyd evacuate the group in shifts later that night, they decided, taking them west to a helipad at the Lamar Dixon Expo Center in Gonzales, outside Baton Rouge. The cost to repair the dome was initially stated by Superdome commission chairman Tim Coulon to be up to $400 million. 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." The moonlight was shining on the water., She paused. However, there weren't enough trucks for the patients, so they had to stay in the dome. WATCH:I Was There: Hurricane Katrina: Rescue Swimmer. He didnt realize how bad things are other there, Wells said. Insurance companies have paid an estimated $41.1 billion on 1.7 million different claims for damage to vehicles, homes, and businesses in six states. 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). At 7 am Katrina is a Category 5 with 160 mph maximum sustained winds. Residents of the B.W. [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. We will investigate if the individuals come forward. 70% of New Orleans occupied housing, 134,000 units, were damaged in the storm. As the already strained levee system continued to give way, the remaining residents of New Orleans were faced with a city that by August 30 was 80 percent underwater. A fire erupted in a trash chute inside the dome, but a National Guard commander said it did not affect the evacuation. I wake up in the morning, and the first thing I say is: Where are my babies? However, this didn't happen because the storm was too strong it happened due to the failures of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. The National Weather Service was revising its forecast again. Hurricane Katrina, 10 years later: The myths that persist, debunked. Tulane University postponed its scheduled football game against the University of Southern Mississippi until November 26. Twenty-five thousand miserable people many of whom lost their homes to Hurricane Katrina hunkered down with little food and little water, overflowing toilets, stifling heat and the unbearable stench of human waste. Levees at various locations in the city had failed, and the pumping stations, overwhelmed with water and damaged by the storm, werent working. 40% of deaths were caused by drowning. Roughly 14,000 people were inside now. Blanco declined to seek reelection in 2007, and died in 2019. "[38] On that same day, 10 deaths were reported at the Superdome by CBS News. 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. In addition, a Bleacher Report article quotes Thornton saying "We're not a hospital. Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast on August 29, 2005. [46] Before that first game, the team announced it had sold out its entire home schedule to season ticket holders a first in the franchise's history.[47]. At St. Rita's Nursing Home, residents were reportedly abandoned by the staff, and 35 people drowned as a result. 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. Out of the at least 1,800 deaths caused by Hurricane Katrina, nearly half were elderly people. But if you see something that doesn't look right, click here to contact us! And although hurricanes are usually only 300 miles wide at most, Hurricane Katrina's winds stretched out over 400 miles, with wind speeds well in excess of 100 mph. Socialist Alternative writes that police were given the task of "defending the private property of businesses like the GAP and casinos" rather than concentrating on rescuing people. This is 40 or 50 feet up in the air. 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. Effect of Hurricane Katrina on the Louisiana Superdome The water pumps had failed, and without water pumps to the elevated building, they couldnt maintain water pressure. They tried to use a trash can to create suction around the generator and pump the water out, but that plan failed. Daylight could be seen from inside the dome, and rain was pouring in. Later that day, Louisiana Governor Kathleen Blanco ordered New Orleans to be completely evacuated. By the following afternoon Katrina had become one of the most powerful Atlantic storms on record, with winds in excess of 170 miles (275 km) per hour. Floodwaters from Hurricane Katrina stranded thousands of New Orleans residents. Some 1.2 million Louisianans were displaced for months or even years, and thousands never returned. I thought it would be two days at most and wed be out, said Thornton. [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. Despite the planned use of the Superdome as an evacuation center, government officials at the local, state and federal level were criticized for poor preparation and response, especially Mayor of New Orleans Ray Nagin, President George W. Bush, Louisiana Governor Kathleen Blanco, and Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) director Michael D. The National Weather Service writes that Hurricane Katrina is "one of the five deadliest hurricanes to ever strike the United States.". A FEMA medical team at the Superdome on August 31, 2005. This was it. So they hoofed it. 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. 2008 Dec;2(4):215-23. doi: 10.1097/DMP.0b013e31818aaf55. 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. When the hurricane made landfall in southeast Louisiana on Aug. 29, 2005, its intensity had diminished but was still a major Category 3 storm. People had broken up into factions by race, separating into small groups throughout the building that the National Guard struggled to control. On the morning of August 29, 2005, Katrina made landfall around 60 miles southeast of New Orleans. And although President Bush said on September 1, "I don't think anyone anticipated the breach of the levees," days before Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans, the White House was informed that the levees were likely to overtop and breach. On April 25, 2006, workers in the Lower Ninth Ward rebuild the levee that was breached by Hurricane Katrina along the Industrial Canal. In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, Black families have also had a harder time rebounding than white families. Most of these rumors were caused because of the breakdown of cellular service, which prevented the distribution of reliable and accurate information. In response, guardsmanput up barbed wire at various areas around the building, protecting themselves from the general population. Kathleen Blanco and New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin were criticized for not ordering mandatory evacuations sooner. 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. FOX Facts: Hurricane Katrina Damage | Fox News ", Socialist Alternative writes the budget of the Crops was slashed after 2003, largely to pay for the Iraq War and tax cuts for the wealthy: "A refusal to invest tens of millions of dollars into strengthening levees has led to a catastrophe that will cost hundreds of billions of dollars." It was the most eerie sight Ill ever recall in my life. Nearly 56% of the losses occurred in Louisiana and nearly 30% occurred in Mississippi. Back in 2005, Nagin went on the Today Show and said, "it wouldn't be unreasonable to have 10,000" deaths from Hurricane Katrina. In the bathrooms, every toilet had ceased to function. The buildings air conditioning system would no longer run, nor would the refrigeration system keeping massive amounts of food from spoiling. All they could do was try to protect the generator. It was going to be the big one. Hurricane Ivan it was less than that. Just looking out I saw glare of the water, she said, choking up. Gunfire has ricocheted down the corridors. Unfortunately, it was made significantly worse than it had to be. It was the costliest natural disaster in U.S. history. The groups went in shifts, sneaking down over to the garage, up the stairs and to the helipad. They found a 50-foot fuel line and screwed it into the reserve tank of the generator, then ran it out to the truck, which was parked in several feet of water outside the exterior door. We had a very, lets just say, heated conversation with one of those guys about where they were positioning those trucks, said Thornton. Some 25,000 crowded into the convention center, while more than 25,000 filled the Superdome. Whatever they needed was theirs. Please refer to the appropriate style manual or other sources if you have any questions. The Associated Press stated there were two substantial holes, "each about 15 to 20 feet (6.1m) long and 4 to 5 feet (1.5m) wide," and that water was making its way in at elevator shafts and other small openings around the building. 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. Still, about 100,000 people were trapped in the city when the storm hit, and many took last-ditch refuge in the New Orleans Superdome and the Ernest J. Morial Convention Center as the storm approached. Never did we think wed be here for nearly a week.. Then the women and the children. 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.". The outer ends of the hurricane also produced tornados, although they only damaged power lines and trees. Articles from Britannica Encyclopedias for elementary and high school students. Up to 47% "were caused by acute and chronic diseases." In addition, many of the underlying systemic inequalities and problems that resulted in the severity of the disaster still have not been addressed. In addition, according to the journalSocial Science & Medicine, there were also long-term mental health consequences of Hurricane Katrina. The massive hurricane exposed major issues with the citys infrastructure, left thousands upon thousands of people without any place to stay, destroying their homes and leaving their neighborhoods in ruins. It took 17 men several hours to do the job. The Society Pages writes that there were six deaths in the Superdome: one by suicide, one by overdose, and four from natural causes. Residents of Saucier, Mississippi, line up to get gas on August 31, 2005. Their first game, against Mississippi State University, was played on September 17 at Independence Stadium in Shreveport, Louisiana. Thousands of displaced residents take cover from Hurricane Katrina at the Superdome in New . 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. This is not normal.. It wasnt until midnight that things started to settle down. The Blackhawks had landed on the top parking level of the Superdome, and then the sandbags were driven down to the back door by the generator room. Hurricane Katrina - Facts, Affected Areas & Lives Lost - HISTORY A few of these groups wandered the concourse, stealing food and attacking anyone who stood up to them. According to National Geographic, "some argue that indirect hurricane deaths, like being unable to access medical care, should be counted in official numbers.". In fact, the first hurricane-related deaths occurred the day before Katrina struck when three residents died whilst being evacuated to Baton Rouge. 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. Water spills over a levee along the Inner Harbor Navigational Canal in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina on August 30, 2005, in New Orleans. Messed Up Things That Happened During Hurricane Katrina If it rose, theyd evacuate. 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. The population of New Orleans fell from 484,674 in April 2000 to 230,172 in July 2006, a decrease of over 50%. Hurricane Katrina itself was a natural phenomenon, but most of the flooding in and around New Orleans was the result of the poor construction and design of the city's flood-protection system by. Thornton and Mouton were walking away from the meeting when they heard a loud bang. The Social Science Research Council writes that this disparity occurred because elderly people were neither evacuated nor protected effectively. They were acquitted in 2007. A man pushes his bicycle through flood waters near the Superdome in New Orleans on Aug. 31, 2005. 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. Please select which sections you would like to print: Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree. President Bush was otherwise occupied during this time. A lightning bolt strikes above a destroyed church in the Lower Ninth Ward on August 5, 2006. Thousands more were unable to evacuate, including the nearly 25,000 who sheltered in the Superdome. On the morning of August 29, the storm made landfall as a category 4 hurricane at Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana, approximately 45 miles (70 km) southeast of New Orleans. Local residents gathering outside of the Superdome on September 2, 2005. 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. 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.". Hurricane Katrina made its second and third landfalls in the Gulf Coast region on Monday, August 29, 2005, as a Category 3 hurricane. In this satellite image, a close-up of the center of Hurricane Katrina's rotation is seen at 9:45 a.m. EST on August 29, 2005 over southeastern Louisiana. It has been 10 years since Hurricane Katrina nearly destroyed the city ofNew Orleans. By the evening of August 25, when it made landfall north of the Broward-Miami-Dade county line, it had intensified into a category 1 hurricane. Deaths in the Superdome. This story has been shared 177,659 times. He flew on to Gonzales, where his wife was waiting for him. The men sat in stunned silence. Taking them in through the exterior door would have been quicker, but Thorntoncouldnt risk the flood of water if they opened the back door. All Rights Reserved. Four died of natural causes, one had a drug overdose, and one committed suicide. 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." Photo taken from the I-10-US 90 junction showing most of the white rubber protective membrane over the roof of the Superdome torn away by strong winds during Katrina. Hell if I know, the mechanic said. The federal response to Hurricane Katrina was just as bad as state and local responses. But after the levees broke, the city buses went underwater. Satellite view of the Superdome showing the damaged roof with the New Orleans Arena to the right on August 30, 2005. Hurricane Katrina made landfall off the coast of Louisiana on August 29, 2005. However, tens of thousands of residents could not or would not leave. And food was running short. The National Guards headquarters had flooded, so the entire operation had moved to the Superdome. During the recovery stage, the process wasn't much better. 99% of the 1.2 million personal property claims, The National Flood Insurance Program paid out $16 billion in claims, The majority of all federal aid, approximately $75 billion of $120.5 billion. Hurricane Katrina Statistics Fast Facts | CNN With no relief in sight and in the absence of any organized effort to restore order, some neighbourhoods experienced substantial amounts of looting, and helicopters were used to rescue many people from rooftops in the flooded Ninth Ward. Updated The Superdome was, as far as Thornton was concerned, completely destroyed. If we had evacuated who knows what wouldve happened Thornton said. Hurricane Katrina had intruded on the last safe space. So that means youre going to have to be here probably another 5 or 6 days., Mr. Katrinas death toll is the fourth highest of any hurricane in U.S. history, after the Galveston Hurricane of 1900, which killed between 8,000 and 12,000 people; Hurricane Maria, which killed more than 4,600 people in Puerto Rico in 2017; and the Okeechobee Hurricane, which hit Florida in 1928 and killed as many as 3,000. Water floods a cemetery outside St. Patrick's Church in Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana, on September 11, 2005. They took off running to the concourse, and saw a nightmare come true the roof in one section above the field had been torn off by the wind. [13][35] The attacker was later jailed. Before Hurricane Katrina hit Louisiana, there were roughly 2,000 foster children registered in the state. According to FiveThirtyEight, the Black middle class in particular was all but wiped out, and Black household incomes have fallen. She had heard a lot, from the National Guard, from her husband, from rumors among the employees. Apart from the foster children, roughly 5,000 additional children were listed as missing in the Gulf Coast region after Hurricane Katrina. Rumours spread in the press of reports of rapes, violent assaults, murders, drug abuse, and gang activity inside the Superdome, most of which were entirely unsubstantiated and without witnesses. With top winds of around 80 mph, the storm was relatively weak, but enough to knock out power for about 1 million and cause $630 million of damage. Across 13 nursing homes and six hospitals that were investigated in Louisiana, at least 140 patients died as a result of Hurricane Katrina. The NOPD was gone. We need to get these people into the parking garages, where at least they can get out of the building and into some fresh air.. The 2005 hurricane and subsequent levee failures led to death and destructionand dealt a lasting blow to leadership and the Gulf region. 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. If we let everybody go into the parking garage then were going to lose control of the situation and it could be worse. Instead, its lethality was a direct result of people and the decisions that they made, in regards to the engineering of the levees as well as the poor evacuation plans. Its tenants, the New Orleans Saints, were talking about an open-air stadium on the Mississippi river or moving to another city. Discovery Company. After a traffic jam kept buses from arriving at the Superdome for nearly four hours, a near-riot broke out in the scramble to get on the buses that finally did show up. At their peak, hurricane relief shelters housed 273,000 people. Blood and feces covered the walls of the facility. Parishioners gather during Sunday services in the rebuilt church on May 10, 2015. We're not a hotel. They had to find out if they could move these people. There were two reports of rape, one involving a child. Because of this shortsightedness, Hurricane Katrina was "the nation's first $200 billion disaster.". The population of New Orleans fell from 484,674 in April 2000 to 230,172 in July 2006, a decrease of over 50%. [52] The Mountaineers won, 3835. In all, 1,833 people would lose their lives. Following the historical damage inflicted by Hurricane Katrina, the name Katrina was retired from the lists of names. Most of the damage caused by Hurricane Katrina was due to the fact that New Orleans' levees and floodwalls were breached. This was it. Messed Up Things That Happened During Hurricane Katrina - Grunge.com Is everyone here? . FACT CHECK: We strive for accuracy and fairness. He could only offer supplies. - Numerous failures of levees around New Orleans led to catastrophic flooding in the city. Bloodstains smeared the walls near vending machines that had been pried open. Weve been here since 6 a.m., and this is getting worse and worse, State Police Officer K.W. In addition to two unarmed civilians killed at Danziger Bridge, at least ten other people were shot by police in the first week after Hurricane Katrina hit Louisiana. Over the next several days the Domewould sink into chaos. However, not a single one of those reports was "verified or substantiated. katrina Why Did Hurricane Katrina Kt Women So Hard? They write new content and verify and edit content received from contributors. Isaac Chipps contributed reporting to this story. At noon, he boarded a helicopter. The Black population of New Orleans has also fallen, since out of the 175,000 Black residents who left New Orleans, over 75,000 never returned. That night SMG sent a private helicopter to evacuate the staff and their families. The National Flood Insurance Program paid out $16 billion in claims. Hurricane Katrina - Wikipedia You need to go take a look. Terry Ebbert, head of the citys emergency operations, warned that the slow evacuation at the Superdome had become an incredibly explosive situation, and he bitterly complained that the Federal Emergency Management Agency was not offering enough help. Many of them boarded without having any idea of where they were headed. FEMA infamously brought in trailers, "hastily built and steeped in toxic resins," that were used to house people after the hurricane. Most of the tragedies associated with Hurricane Katrina could have been avoided, but due to a variety of reasons, the hurricane quickly became one of the worst disasters to ever occur in the United States. We've received your submission. 14 Days - A Timeline | The Storm | FRONTLINE | PBS 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. ", Ultimately, it's unknown exactly what the death toll of Hurricane Katrina was. 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. From Morgan City, Louisiana, to Biloxi, Mississippi, to Mobile, Alabama, Hurricane Katrina's wind, rain, and . The streets were still flooded, perhaps even worse than before. . No one knew what would happen. Thornton, pacing inside, turned to one of the mechanics. 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. [15] Evacuees began to break into the luxury suites, concession stands, vending machines, and offices to look for food and other supplies. According to CBS News, it took until March 2006 to find all of them: "All but 12 were found alive. And cars were overturned on Poydras Street.. [4], On August 28, 2005, at 6 am, New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin announced that the Superdome would be used as a public shelter. Huge crowds of seething and tense people jammed the main concourse outside the dome hoping to get on the buses to the Astrodome in Houston, 350 miles away.