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Excerpts from Katrina Articles: BaltimoreSun, 2005
Background: In August of 2005 Hurricane Katrina struck the GulfCoast. Thousands of people were ordered to evacuate the region, but many did not. Entire towns were flooded and left in rubble. Businesses and homes were destroyed and many lives were lost.
Coast under water, FEMA under fire
Head of federal agency defends disaster response
By Siobhan Gorman
Originally published September 2, 2005
WASHINGTON - Outraged by the federal government's performance in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans' chief of emergency operations appeared to speak for many yesterday along the Gulf Coast and elsewhere:
"This is a national emergency. This is a national disgrace," said Terry Ebbert. "FEMA [Federal Emergency Management Agency] has been here three days, yet there is no command and control. We can send massive amounts of aid to tsunami victims, but we can't bail out the city of New Orleans."
Complaints about the agency's performance in the first days after Katrina struck were not limited to New Orleans, the scene of further chaos yesterday as uncounted thousands of residents desperately sought escape from a lack of food, water and electricity and lawlessness in the streets. From across Mississippi, Alabama and Louisiana came complaints about the government's failure to anticipate and respond more effectively to the crisis as it developed.
As Americans for the first time saw footage of dead bodies in the New Orleans Superdome and the city's mayor resorted to e-mailing an "S.O.S" to CNN in a plea for government help yesterday, a chorus of critics questioned FEMA's ability to respond effectively to catastrophic natural disasters.
Those remaining in city fending for themselves
'We've been abandoned,' police officer says
By Douglas Birch
Originally published September 2, 2005
NEW ORLEANS -- A bitter rain fell as the big policeman in the blue T-shirt with an automatic rifle led his last patrol down flooded North Rampart Street yesterday, heading for the hotel where his wife and children were holed up. They had no food, no water, no fuel, no rescue boats, no life preservers and no clear idea of what they were doing. Several said they were planning to leave.
At a time when Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco said the city's police were being taken off rescue duty to fight looting, some officers said they had heard rumors police were being evacuated from the city.
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"We just don't have the supplies," [a policeman] said. "The federal troops, they have unlimited resources, unlimited access to anything they need. They have generators. They have boats. They have trucks. We can't rescue people any more. It's pretty much 100 percent out of our hands."
As attacks on police escalated, he said, the mood in the precinct house gradually changed, from a concern about saving the lives of others to fears for their own survival. "There's nothing we can do except protect what we have, and protect ourselves," he said.
Ruined city turns violent
In New Orleans, looting in streets, rapes at shelter and bodies on sidewalks
By Douglas Birch, Stacey Hirsh and Arthur Hirsch
Originally published September 2, 2005
NEW ORLEANS - Hurricane survivors faced mounting danger yesterday as shelters turned violent, a hospital staff came under sniper fire, and emergency food and drinking water were scarce in a city awash in floodwater. Some of the lucky ones escaped from the Superdome on buses bound for Texas, while thousands massed outside the Convention Center, where several people died waiting for help, their shrouded bodies left on the sidewalk.
Thousands of National Guard military police arrived to help restore order, but not before the street violence of the past few days took a horrifying turn. A hospital crew in the midst of moving a patient was fired on by a sniper, and the police chief said rapes were reported in the Convention Center, where some officers were beaten by an angry crowd. A Coast Guard commander told of rescue crews being threatened and shot at.
A military helicopter tried to land at the Convention Center several times to drop off food and water. But the rushing crowd forced it to back off. Soldiers tossed the supplies to the crowd from 10 feet off the ground and flew away. The Coast Guard had rescued about 2,900 stranded people by helicopter and boat.
La. governor requests 40,000 Guard troops
Soldiers would provide security in New Orleans
By Tom Bowman
Originally published September 2, 2005
WASHINGTON - As hurricane-ravaged New Orleans descended into lawlessness, with looting punctuated by gunfire, residents pleaded again yesterday for enough police and National Guard troops to protect them.
But officials acknowledged that state government agencies and National Guard forces were either quickly overwhelmed by the scope of the security problem or diverted to other essential tasks - from search and rescue to debris removal - as chaos consumed the city of nearly half a million.
From the start, Louisiana appeared to lack enough Guard troops with the specific skills to handle the lawlessness, namely military police and other security forces.
2006-7TOG-1American Government