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Major storms a familiar event in New Orleans region

By RANDOLPH E. SCHMID
Associated Press Writer

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Major storms a familiar event in New Orleans region

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By RANDOLPH E. SCHMID

Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) – The final tally will no doubt show Hurricane Katrina gave the New Orleans region its worst weather battering ever – but major storms are no stranger to the area.

As recently as Sept. 27, 1998, Hurricane Georges threatened the city, prompting a large scale evacuation of the Big Easy and the first use of the Louisiana Superdome as a last-resort shelter. That evacuation effort was the largest such effort in U.S. history to that time.

And as early as 1722, when the city was only a few years old, its first great hurricane arrived, on Sept. 12.

"Toward 10 o'clock in the evening there sprang up the most terrible hurricane which has been seen in these quarters," Diron D'Artaguiette wrote in his journal. "At New Orleans 34 houses were destroyed as well as the sheds, including the parsonage and hospital."

Again in 1779 a mighty storm swept into the city, prompting the then Spanish governor Bernardo de Galvez to report: "The village presents the most pitiful sight. There are but few houses which have not been destroyed, and there are so many wrecked to pieces."

William Dunbar, a longtime American resident of the region, reported on storms in 1779 and 1780.

"I was in New Orleans during the first of those two. More than half of the town was stript of its covering, many houses thrown down in town and country," Dunbar wrote, "no ship of vessel of any kind was seen on the river next morning.

The reports from D'Artaguiette, de Galvez and Dunbar are published in the book "Early American Hurricanes" by David M. Ludlum, which also notes major storms striking the region in 1794 and 1812.

Under the headline "Awful and Distressing," the New Orleans Gazette reported that the 1812 storm "continued with most dreadful violence for upwards of four hours."

An 1831 hurricane produced heavy damage when an overflow from Lake Pontchartrain swamped parts of the city. This was reported as the strongest since 1812 at New Orleans.

No less than three hurricanes battered the city in 1860.

"Another Terrific Storm," the New Orleans Picayune lamented in October, adding a new chapter to batterings in August and September.

More recent hurricanes blasting the Crescent City, according to the National Weather Service, have included:

–Sept. 29, 1915: A devastating hurricane moved over Grand Isle and into the Greater New Orleans area. Winds were measured at 140 mph at Grand Isle. Some 275 people were killed across Southeast Louisiana. In Leeville, LA, only one building out of 100 survived the storm.

–Sept. 19, 1947: Hurricane crossed the Mississippi and Louisiana coast moving into Lake Borgne and over downtown New Orleans. Tides rose to 12 feet at Biloxi, Bay Saint Louis and Gulfport, Miss. A total of 51 lives were lost, 17 in Florida, 12 in Louisiana and 22 in Mississippi.

–Sept. 24, 1956: Hurricane Flossy completely submerged Grand Isle and bore down on the Greater New Orleans area. Residents evacuated to shelters with fear of the 1947 hurricane on their minds.

–Oct. 3, 1964: Hurricane Hilda reached maximum strength about 350 miles south of New Orleans and headed into Southeast Louisiana. Winds to 135 mph were recorded at Franklin, La. There were 38 fatalities.

–Sept. 9, 1965: Hurricane Betsy struck while the city was still recovering from Hilda. A storm surge of 10 feet caused New Orleans' worst flooding since the hurricane of 1947. Betsy claimed 81 lives and was the first U.S. hurricane to produce over $1 billion damage.

–Aug. 17, 1969: Hurricane Camille, a category 5 storm, the most powerful, came ashore just east of the mouth of the Mississippi, making landfall at Pass Christian, Miss. Winds sustained over 200 mph at peak and a 25-foot storm surge crashed into the coast. There were 258 deaths including nine in Louisiana.

– Aug. 26, 1992: Hurricane Andrew, after battering South Florida, moved into south Louisiana. Andrew spawned a deadly tornado in Laplace, La., killing 2 people and causing $1.5 million damage several hours prior to Andrew's landfall.

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Doc: 00264103 DB: research–d–2005–3 Date: Wed Aug 31 18:56:24 2005

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Once the driver of the state's economy, Mississippi coast now a big stretch of rubble

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By HOLBROOK MOHR

Associated Press Writer

GULFPORT, Miss. (AP) – From the coin-spitting slot machines to the stately Southern beach cottages, Mississippi's coastline has long been the economic engine for the entire state. But every industry along the coast has been devastated by Hurricane Katrina in a way that will take years, if not decades, to recover.

Hotels collapsed into rubble and flashy casinos were tossed across highways. Shrimping boats were violently slammed into land. Shipyards were heavily damaged, oil rigs were destroyed.

In the short term, survivors are concerned with caring for the injured, burying the dead and restoring the basics of water, food, power and communications. In the long term, many are worried that the storm has made the area uninhabitable.

"I lost everything. We can't even find my car," said Landon Williams, a 19-year-old construction worker in Biloxi whose apartment complex collapsed, killing several neighbors. "I'm looking through this wreckage to see if I can find anything that's mine. If not. I'm moving on. I can't take it here any more – not after this."

About 14,000 people work in the dozen casinos along the Mississippi coastline. Each casino has a land-based hotel, and thousands more work in those. All were closed and some were damaged beyond repair.

State Gaming Commission director Larry Gregory said the state loses about $500,000 in tax revenue each day the coastal casinos are closed. In 2004, Mississippi Tax Commission figures showed casino revenues statewide – including the coast casinos and others along the Mississippi River – were $2.7 billion, behind only Nevada and New Jersey.

Another hard-hit area was at the Northrop Grumman shipyards in Gulfport and Pascagoula, which employ 12,000 people in the state.

Every city on the coast took heavy damage, but Waveland, a beach town of 7,000 that was heavily damaged by Hurricane Camille in 1969, had some of the worst, with nearly every building leveled by a storm surge that pushed debris more than a mile from the beach.

"Total devastation. There's nothing left," said Brian Mollere, sitting in a makeshift camp on the site where his jewelry store stood until Monday morning. "Waveland was a beautiful town. It had just bounced back from Camille. They were planning new streets. People were buying new homes."

Other cities were also damaged, and it was hard for anyone to imagine the scope of the rebuilding.

"It's beyond imagination," Gov. Haley Barbour said. "I never thought I'd see something that looks worse than Camille, but this looks worse than Camille."

The governor said the recovery process would be long.

"We're going to rebuild the coast bigger and better than ever," he said. "But it's not going to get done next month. It's probably not going to get finished next year. It's going to be a long time. We're in it for the long haul."

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Associated Press reporters Cain Burdeau and Emily Wagster Pettus contributed to this story.

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Navy chief calls for more cooperation between military, relief groups

By M.L. JOHNSON

Associated Press Writer

NEWPORT, R.I. (AP) – As the U.S. Navy sent ships to aid in the Hurricane Katrina relief effort on Wednesday, its top military officer called for more cooperation in the future between relief groups, government agencies and the military.

Adm. Mike Mullen said lessons could be learned from relief efforts for the tsunami that devastated parts of Asia in December, and from Europe, where relief groups and the military have worked together to respond to hardships created by war.

"My preference would have been to meet those people before we were in the middle of a problem in Kosovo, which is a pretty tense situation," Mullen told officers at the Naval War College in his first major speech as chief of naval operations.

Mullen oversaw NATO missions in the Balkans, Iraq and the Mediterranean and commanded the U.S. naval forces before being named to the Navy's top post on July 22.

As the Navy aids hurricane victims, Mullen said he also was concerned about Seabees stationed in Gulfport, Miss., which was badly hit by the storm. With power and phone service out, sailors have not been able to check in with their superiors.

"I am trying to locate the people there and their families," he said.

Mullen said he expects to have command and control operations established in the area by Thursday, and the Navy will then assess the disaster and decide what needs to be done.

Mullen said he was a fan of the process that realigned military bases around the country, which is under way this year, but said the military must be careful as it consolidates operations to cut costs. He noted that Hurricane Katrina left one of the Navy's major suppliers, a Northrop Grumman shipyard in Pascagoula, Miss., underwater.

"It does make you think about putting all your eggs in one basket, quite frankly, and what you are willing to pay not to do that," he said.

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Mississippi town practically wiped off the map by Katrina

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AP Graphic HURR KATRINA ROUNDUP

By CAIN BURDEAU

Associated Press Writer

WAVELAND, Miss. (AP) – Hurricane Katrina seemed to take a particular vengeance out on this town.

The storm virtually wiped Waveland off the map, prompting state officials to say it took a harder hit from the wind and water than any other town along the coast.

Rescue workers there Wednesday found shell-shocked survivors scavenging what they could from homes and businesses that were completely washed away. The air smelled of natural gas, lumber and rotting flesh.

"Total devastation. There's nothing left," said Brian Mollere, a resident who was left cut and bruised. Katrina tore his clothes off and he had to dig in the debris for shorts and a T-shirt.

Katrina dragged away nearly every home and business within a half mile of the beach, leaving driveways and walkways to nowhere. The water scattered random reminders of what had been normal, quiet lives: family photos, Barbie dolls, jazz records, whiskey bottles.

The town of 7,000 about 35 miles east of New Orleans has been partially cut off because the U.S. 90 bridge over the Bay of St. Louis was destroyed. There is no power, no phones, no way out – and nowhere to go.

State officials would not confirm a death toll in the town, but Mayor Tommy Longo estimated that at least 50 residents died, The Clarion-Ledger reported. City Hall is gone, with nothing but a knee-high mural of a beach scene still standing.

Mollere had set up camp on the wreckage where his family's two-story home and jewelry store once stood. A couple of chairs and a sheet of plastic protected him and his dog from the sun and spits of rain.

Mollere doesn't usually smoke, but he sucked on a Kool menthol and collected bottles of whiskey and Barq's root beer that had washed up nearby.

He recalled swimming out of the store with the dog as the water rose and finding shelter in a house that survived. "If it had been night, I would have drowned," he said.

His 80-year-old mother did drown in the storm. She had evacuated with some family to a grocery store in neighboring Bay St. Louis. As her family members swam away to escape the storm, his mother, who used an oxygen tank, stayed behind.

Mollere's father was a local folk hero for being one of the few people to stay behind in Waveland during Hurricane Camille in 1969. The elder Mollere swam along and grabbed onto a white horse, and both were saved.

On Wednesday, Jim Clack held the hand of his elderly mother, Mercedes Clack, and led her through the rubble of her Waveland home.

"You might fall, Mama," he said gently.

Mercedes Clack, blocking the glare with wraparound sunglasses, said of her splintered home: "Oh, that was a beautiful house. Remember it?"

She brightened when she found an antique radio and a few of her jazz records. "Do you think they can be salvaged?" she asked her son.

Other sweaty, mud-caked survivors camped out in shopping center parking lots in Waveland and neighboring Bay St. Louis, some using tents or mattresses they had been taken from stores. People lined up to get ice and bottled water distributed by emergency workers.

Frank Lombardo said he and his fiancee, Bridgette Favre, tried to weather the storm in their apartment, but moved to a high school in Bay St. Louis when the wind and rain grew too strong. He said he broke into the gym's football supply room to find cloth bandages to wrap some elderly people's wounds.

Marcel and Shannon Whavers and their 2-year-old daughter, Ayanna, stood Wednesday at the end of the devastated bridge that connected Bay St. Louis and Pass Christian. They said they felt cut off from the world.

"We're in trouble for a long time," said Shannon Whavers, 29.

"What are you going to do?" said her 30-year-old husband. "We saw a guy just lying in the highway, not knowing where to go."

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Gasoline prices leap, crude slips, gasoline supplies being rationed to retailers

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AP Graphic OIL PRICES

By BRAD FOSS

AP Business Writer

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Gasoline prices leaped nationwide Wednesday as key refineries and pipelines remained crippled by Hurricane Katrina, crimping supplies and leading to caps on the amount of fuel delivered to retailers.

To boost supplies, the U.S. government said it would loan oil to refiners facing shortfalls and relax environmental restrictions on the type of gasoline sold during summer. Crude futures prices fell but remained close to $69 a barrel.

Just how bad the situation becomes for motorists, who are facing pump prices in excess of $3 a gallon in a growing number of markets, depends on how quickly electricity can be restored to Gulf Coast pipelines and refineries, analysts said. Flooding may have left some important refinery equipment submerged and it will be days before a full damage assessment is completed, industry officials and analysts said.

Some rays of hope emerged Wednesday. The Colonial Pipeline Co. said it would restore partial service with help from diesel generators that will allow it to begin shipping gasoline, heating oil and jet fuel from Houston to markets up and down the East Coast. Similarly, the Louisiana Offshore Oil Port, through which 10 percent of all U.S. oil imports flow, said generators would enable it to gradually resume partial service.

"Every little bit is going to help," said oil analyst John Kilduff at Fimat USA in New York.

A significant amount of oil and gas production in the Gulf of Mexico remains shut and reports of banged-up platforms and rigs continued to trickle in as companies conducted aerial inspections of offshore facilities.

Onshore, wholesale gasoline suppliers have begun capping the amount of fuel they sell to retailers in certain markets to make sure retailers do not take delivery of more fuel than they actually need. Analysts said that while shortages have been reported in a small number markets, they do not believe the problem is widespread and they cautioned motorists not to top off tanks out of fear.

With retail gasoline prices surging to record highs and motorists facing $3 a gallon at the pump in a growing number of markets, BP PLC said in an e-mail to clients that it is making "pricing decisions with prudence and restraint in the wake of this natural disaster."

Light sweet crude for October delivery on the New York Mercantile Exchange fell 87 cents to settle at $68.94 a barrel, down from an overnight high of $70.65. On Tuesday, oil futures settled at $69.81, the highest closing price on Nymex since trading began in 1983, although still below the inflation-adjusted high of about $90 a barrel that was set in 1980.

October gasoline futures surged as high as $2.92 a gallon on Nymex and settled at $2.6145 per gallon, an increase of 14 cents. That is 35 percent higher than they were on Friday.

"There's too much uncertainty," said Kilduff said.

While the details were being worked out about how much oil would be loaned from the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve – and which refiners would receive it – European nations began considering the release of their own government-controlled stockpiles of gasoline and heating oil, according to officials at the Paris-based International Energy Agency. The officials demanded anonymity because the consultations were confidential.

"We're the highest (wholesale) price market in the world right now," said Lawrence J. Goldstein, president of the New York-based nonprofit Petroleum Industry Research Foundation. "We're going to attract a lot of supply here. Price is a magnet for supply."

In another attempt to ease the crunch on motor fuel supplies, the Environmental Protection Agency said it would temporarily allow retailers nationwide to sell gasoline and diesel that does not meet stringent summer air-quality standards.

Gasoline supplies are tightening in some states because some major Gulf Coast energy companies, which were already struggling to meet rising demand before Katrina plowed through the region, have been plagued by floods and power outages that have made it impossible to produce and distribute fuel.

At least eight Gulf refineries remain out of service, and will be for days if not weeks, according to analysts, though most of their owners have not yet publicly announced the extent of any damage. Companies also worked Wednesday to touch base with their employees, some of whom remain unaccounted for. Exxon Mobil Corp., for example, set up a hotline for its workers to call.

Several pipelines that carry gasoline, heating oil and jet fuel to other markets have been stymied by disruptions to power grids and utility workers from around the country converged on the Gulf Coast to help restore electricity.

The shutdown of a pipeline that carries crude oil from the Gulf of Mexico to the Midwest has increased the need for Canadian imports, industry officials said. And the shutdown of pipelines that carry various fuels to markets on the East Coast means that more gasoline and diesel will have to be shipped by barge and by truck, according to John Eichberger, director of motor fuels at the National Association of Convenience Stores.

"The infrastructure was already strained before the hurricane," said oil analyst Fadel Gheit at Oppenheimer & Co. in New York. "The hurricane has made a bad situation worse."

The U.S. Minerals Management Service said Wednesday that 91 percent of the Gulf of Mexico's oil output was out of service, with more than 6 million barrels of production lost since Friday. The agency said 83 percent of natural gas output was shut down, resulting in a loss of 34.2 billion cubic feet of lost production since Friday.

While the loss of oil is significant, Energyintel analyst Tom Wallin said Katrina would likely have a more serious impact on the nation's supply of natural gas.

"Crude oil production could be replaced by a release of barrels from the U.S. strategic reserve," he said. "There is no such safety valve for natural gas."

Natural gas futures fell 35.9 cents to $11.30 per 1,000 cubic feet on Nymex. That is almost double the price from a year ago.

Heating oil futures slipped 2.29 cents to $2.053 per gallon.

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Associated Press Writers Steve Quinn in Dallas, George Jahn in Vienna, Austria and En-Lai Yeoh in Singapore contributed to this report.

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Questions and answers about the nation's emergency oil stockpile

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By DARLENE SUPERVILLE

Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) – The Bush administration considers Hurricane Katrina's disruption of crude oil deliveries to refineries serious enough that it will release oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, the nation's emergency stockpile, to ease the situation.

Nearly all, or 95 percent, of oil output in the Gulf of Mexico was out of service as a result of the hurricane, according to the U.S. Minerals Management Service. The powerful storm closed or reduced operations at eight refineries, taking out anywhere from 8 percent to 10 percent of the nation's production capacity, according to company and federal reports.

Here, in question and answer form, is a look at the Strategic Petroleum Reserve.

Q: What is it?

A: The Strategic Petroleum Reserve is the world's largest stockpile of emergency crude oil. It currently holds 700 million barrels, near its capacity of 727 million barrels. The federal government owns the oil and stores it in underground salt caverns at four sites near the Gulf of Mexico in Texas and Louisiana.

Q: Why does it exist?

A: The reserve is an emergency resource for the president to use when the country is facing oil-supply disruptions that threaten the U.S. economy. It was created after the 1973 oil embargo when Arab countries halted petroleum exports to protest U.S. support for Israel.

In December 1975, President Ford signed legislation making it U.S. policy to create a reserve capable of holding up to 1 billion barrels of oil as an insurance policy against future supply disruptions. The first deposit, 412,000 barrels of Saudi Arabian crude, was made in July 1977.

Q: Where does the oil come from?

A: Oil companies. They supply it in lieu of paying cash royalties for oil pumped on federally owned land. In the past, the government has bought crude on the open market specifically for the reserve, but President Clinton ended that practice in 1994 for budget reasons.

Q: How is the oil released?

A: In one of two ways, either by loan or by sale. The oil to be released in response to Hurricane Katrina's disruptions will be lent to affected oil refiners. Some previous loans were granted in September-October 2004 after Hurricane Ivan, and in October 2002 after Hurricane Lili.

President George H.W. Bush ordered the first sale of oil from the reserve in January 1991 during the Persian Gulf War as part of a global effort to stabilize world oil markets. Twenty-one million barrels were released and sold in 1990 and 1991.

Q: How much oil will be withdrawn in response to Hurricane Katrina?

A: The amount was still being determined, but oil can be pumped out a maximum rate of just over 4 million barrels a day, about one-fifth of the daily U.S. demand of slightly more than 20 million barrels a day. Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman said Wednesday he was reviewing applications. Gulf Coast refiners will use the oil to replace hurricane-interrupted shipments from tankers or offshore oil platforms.

Q: When will the oil be released?

A: Oil could start flowing out of the reserve as early as Thursday, Energy Department spokesman Craig Stevens said.

Q: Will the oil be replaced?

A: Yes. Companies must return the borrowed oil, plus bonus amounts, later on.

Q: How will releasing oil from the reserve affect gas prices?

A: It probably won't. Bodman warned consumers Wednesday not to expect any sudden drop in prices at the pump. "Will it make a major difference in the price of gasoline?" he said in an interview with The Associated Press. "Based on the numbers that I see, probably not."

Q: Does politics ever factor into discussions about the reserve?

A: Yes. The reserve has been at the center of frequent disputes over high energy prices. During the 2000 presidential campaign, Republican candidate George W. Bush criticized President Clinton's decision to dip into the reserves, arguing that it was a politically motivated attempt to ease prices and boost the election prospects of his vice president, Democrat Al Gore.

Since becoming president in 2001, Democrats have urged Bush to use reserve oil to temper rising energy prices. He has refused, insisting that the reserves be used only for emergencies, not to influence prices.

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Pentagon coordinating massive response to Katrina

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By LOLITA C. BALDOR

Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) – From Navy ships and Army helicopters to the USNS Comfort hospital ship, the Pentagon is mobilizing possibly an unprecedented U.S. rescue-and-relief mission for areas devastated by Hurricane Katrina.

A key priority Wednesday was developing a plan for the massive evacuation of the Superdome in New Orleans, which has become a shelter of last resort for about 20,000 people.

Lt. Col. Rich Steele said officials were planning to bring helicopters in to fly out the several thousand people there who cannot walk, and to get buses for the rest. The people, he said, will probably be taken to shelters throughout the area.

Gov. Kathleen Blanco has said that she wants the Superdome evacuated within two days because the situation has been worsening there. The water has been rising, the air conditioning was out and toilets were broken.

As of mid-afternoon, Coast Guard air and boat crews had rescued 1,259 people across the region and recovery teams were delivering food, water, medical equipment and other supplies, said Lt. Cmdr. Jeff Carter.

Five offshore Louisiana oil rigs were missing and two more adrift in the Gulf of Mexico, Carter said. Another submergible rig was grounded. Additionally, the Coast Guard station in Gulfport, Miss., was destroyed while another in Venice, La., is partially under water. Two other Coast Guard stations – in New Orleans and Grand Isle, Ala. – have sustained slight or little damage, Carter said.

All Gulf of Mexico ports remained closed, Carter said. He called reopening ports and other Mississippi River waterways a high priority, but added that navigation systems and environmental cleanup would likely be prolonged.

So far, an estimated 4,000 Coast Guard personnel have been deployed to emergency areas, including teams responsible for maritime security, oil and hazardous materials, and navigation aid. Four Coast Guard personnel from the Mobile, Ala., area are missing, Carter said.

Largely coordinated by a newly created military Joint Task Force Katrina, based at Camp Shelby in Mississippi, all of the armed services are participating in what many say is the largest domestic disaster relief effort in years. The military is mainly providing search and rescue, medical help and sending in supplies in support of the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the Gulf Coast states of Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama.

The head of the task force, Lt. Gen. Russel Honore, was meeting with other military commanders and FEMA officials and flying over the ravaged New Orleans region Wednesday afternoon to assess the damage.

Wednesday morning, four Navy ships loaded with supplies – ranging from food and water to soap and medical supplies – were preparing to leave Virginia, and they were expected to arrive in the Gulf by the weekend, according to the Navy. This is the largest relief effort taken on by the Navy since the tsunami response in Indonesia last December.

Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said the Defense Department will provide whatever support is needed by the states and FEMA, and will have ships and aircraft on standby throughout the region to respond.

In addition, the hospital ship USNS Comfort was leaving Baltimore en route to the Gulf region and eight water rescue SEAL teams from California were on the way to Lafayette, La., with small, rigid hulled boats that can work in shallow water to pull stranded residents from their flooded homes and neighborhoods. They were expected to arrive Wednesday.

The Army and Air Force were also providing search and rescue helicopters, and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers was organizing what will be one of its largest response efforts in recent memory.

National Guard troops from at least eight states are going into the region to provide law enforcement support, communications, medical help, debris removal and other assistance.

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Associated Press writer Lara Jakes Jordan contributed to this report.

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In Katrina's wake, prayers in the Gulf Coast

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By RACHEL ZOLL

AP Religion Writer

After the storm that destroyed everything, there was little else to do but pray.

In heavily Roman Catholic Louisiana, and along the religiously conservative Gulf Coast, survivors of Hurricane Katrina sought the presence of God when no other help seemed near.

Ida Punzo, who survived the storm in her 130-year-old home in Biloxi, Miss., said, "This place is held together with God's spit."

"God's got our back," said Josephine Elow, 73, at the hotel Le Richelieu in New Orleans' French Quarter.

Aaron Williams arrived at the Superdome with a small crate of what remained of his property: canned goods, water, cigarettes and a Bible.

"No matter what religion you are, whether you're a Catholic, whether you're voodoo, whether you're Baptist or so on, so on, and so on – we all pray. We all pray," Gail Henke said after the hurricane blew through New Orleans.

The city is a hothouse of faith: a mix of Roman Catholicism, black Protestantism and Afro-Caribbean religions. Alongside Catholic churches are mostly black "spiritual churches" that blend the city's three major influences, according to Rodger Payne, chairman of the philosophy and religion department at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge.

Black Protestants in the region tend to be religious conservatives who believe in living a "morally upright life," no matter what poverty and hardships they face, said Melissa Harris-Lacewell, a University of Chicago political scientist who researches race and religion.

"These are folks who really believe the Bible is the literal word of God," she said.

So it was no surprise that they sought spiritual relief from their unbearable burdens.

Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco asked residents to spend Wednesday in prayer. "That would be the best thing to calm our spirits and thank our Lord that we are survivors," she said.

Outsiders joined them. Unlike the days following the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, volunteers could not quickly pour into the area from other parts of the country to help with cleanup. But they could send a check to a relief group and ask God to protect the victims.

The World Prayer Center at the New Life Church in Colorado Springs, Colo., asked its 70,000 members to pray for the Gulf Coast and send money to charities involved in the cleanup.

Pope Benedict XVI offered his prayers, and the head of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops asked all the nation's parishes to take collections for relief and to pray.

Some religious Americans are viewing the destruction as a sign of God's wrath against a sinful city, or a signal of the end-times – theories that mainstream religious thinkers reject.

William Lawrence, dean of the Perkins School of Theology at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, said faith should be a comfort to the survivors, not a tool for doomsday thinking.

"The most basic elements of life and existence are the only things we have left in a tragedy like this," said Lawrence, who has lived through two hurricanes. "When everything else is gone, we ask, `What are the sources of strength to which I can turn?'"

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After the waters recede, reclaiming the Big Easy will require hard decisions

By MATT CRENSON

AP National Writer

An astonishing phenomenon – the drowning of New Orleans – leads to a mind-boggling question: How to rebuild a city? Some are already considering the challenge.

Officials from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers estimate it will be weeks before all the water that flowed into the city through breached levees can be pumped back out. After that, it will take several years – and many billions of dollars – to rebuild homes, offices, streets and highways.

It is the decisions people make as they go through that process that will determine what New Orleans eventually becomes, disaster recovery experts said. From the major political battles over how to spend public funds to each family's deliberation over whether to return to a city where there's not much to go back to, the choices people make in the weeks and months ahead will determine the Big Easy's fate.

"It will reveal a lot about the power structure of New Orleans," said Lawrence Vale, a professor of urban studies and planning at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Federal, state and city government will need to make big investments in infrastructure – especially flood protection – to entice businesses back to the city and reassure insurers that nothing like this is going to happen again any time soon. They will also have to convince people that the city is a safe place to live.

The owners of single-family homes are usually the first to rebuild after a hurricane, said Walter Peacock, director of the Hazard Reduction and Recovery Center at Texas A&M University. But because fewer than 50 percent of New Orleans homeowners have flood insurance, many of them probably won't have financial resources to rebuild at all.

Condominiums and rental housing take longer to come back simply because they have more complicated insurance and financing issues to work out. That can make finding a place to live in the aftermath of a disaster extremely difficult for renters, especially poor ones. The flooding has wiped out many of the neighborhoods where low-income minorities live, making their situation especially tenuous as the city recovers.

"If you get reinvestment it probably isn't going to be targeted at those people," Peacock said. "That could be a major problem in New Orleans if that housing doesn't come back."

Because low-income housing in the Florida Keys has not been replaced after hurricanes, he said, the resort area's hotels and restaurants now have trouble finding enough employees. Many of them have to commute from Homestead, south of Miami.

Ironically, the destruction caused by Katrina gives New Orleans residents the opportunity to gird themselves against the next hurricane that pounds into their city. Even before Katrina hit, Louisiana was considering a stronger building code that would require more wind-resistant designs for roofs and walls. With the proper building materials and techniques, a house can usually survive a Category 5 storm intact, said Marc Levitan, a professor of civil and environmental engineering at Louisiana State University.

The new rules should be instituted as soon as possible, Levitan recommended, before people start to rebuild.

"It would be nice if we could make some recommendations and get them in place so we're not building the same thing that fell down last time," he said.

Katrina also gives the Corps of Engineers, which is responsible for flood control in New Orleans, the opportunity to modify the network of levees it uses to keep water out of the city. The structures that are currently in place are designed to withstand a Category 3 hurricane, but the Corps has been considering an upgrade for several years that could handle a Category 5 storm.

"I think there's a lot of opportunities for improving the levees," said Joannes J. Westerink, a civil engineer at the University of Notre Dame. "There are lots of ways of protecting the city."

They all cost money, of course. So for New Orleans and everyone who has a stake in it, the big question over the next few years will be how much to spend and what to spend it on.

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Katrina's diaspora, thrown to the winds and longing for home

By DEBORAH HASTINGS

AP National Writer

HATTIESBURG, Miss. (AP) – The refugees of Hurricane Katrina, scattered in every kind of motel from tawdry to Best Western, just want to go home.

But they are stranded in this swamp-hot purgatory of Southern Mississippi, where nothing runs. Not the tap water, not the toilets, not the ATM machines, not phones of any kind – and most definitely, not the air conditioning.

"I don't know what's going on," said Linda Rowe, a poker dealer who does know her Biloxi casino was blown across U.S. Highway 90 – she saw it on a generator-run television propped on the back of a pickup truck in the motel parking lot.

"I just want to get out of here," she said. "It's just awful."

None of the evacuees know what is left of their homes, or when they'll be allowed to get even close to them.

Except the folks from New Orleans. They know that they'll be away even longer.

"Nuthin', nuthin', nuthin'," groaned Craig "Poncho" Thompson. "We got nuthin'."

He and his fiancee, Gabriella Frank, left their New Orleans home on Lake Pontchartrain at noon Sunday. "My fiancee waited 'til the last minute. I'm a man, I was ready to go."

Getting out the door proved the easiest task. It took them 10 hours to make Meridian, Miss., a drive that normally takes three.

After one night, they moved south to devastated Hattiesburg, where there were motel rooms, but little else.

Thousands of others were engaged in this same, storm-induced migration, setting out for safety in all directions, bunking with friends or family or settling down at any hostelry or shelter that would have them.

Kenny Graves, 55, is staying at the Central Elementary School shelter in Gulfport, Miss. He waited in a long line at a pharmacy for water.

"They don't have no food, no water. It's about 300 people over there," Graves said. "Last night we built a wood fire, and this lady went to her house and got a bunch of hot dogs and we cooked them on the wood fire for the kids. The adults had crackers."

Memphis officials estimated that the influx of refugees had swelled their Tennessee city's population by more than 10,000, and they set up a committee to help find temporary housing. Schools there announced they would take in kids who had left their usual classes far behind.

"Even if this causes some discomfort to some degree, it's all about the kids," said spokesman Vince McCaskill. "The key for us now is just to get those kids in school."

In Hattiesburg, a city of 45,000 that is home to the University of Southern Mississippi, an unknown number of refugees were all in the same boat, or wishing they had one.

U.S. Highway 49, which leads south into Gulfport, is closed. Tall pines, uprooted or snapped at their base, blocked parts of the road. Downed power lines twisted like yarn through trees at half mast, and traffic snarled both sides of the four-lane highway that cuts through this city.

Everyone was searching for the same thing: gas.

Gas and rumors of gas prompted evacuees to drive aimlessly for miles, wasting precious fuel. Stranded vehicles with empty tanks have been abandoned along the clogged road, forcing some to take drastic measures.

A smiling middle-aged woman in tight leopard-print pants, who looked as if she had dressed for the occasion, strode into the middle of Highway 49 and stuck out her thumb.

When that didn't work, she lost her smile, and started screaming. No one stopped.

With no way to talk to the outside world and little chance to see it, stories spread like bad rumors. The next town over had electricity (it didn't). The National Guard was bringing in gas tankers (not yet). Electricity wouldn't be restored for two months (who knows).

P.J. Tadej is lucky. His house in Gulfport survived. His wife, his two kids, and the dogs he breeds – all 14 of them – holed up in Hattiesburg's Comfort Inn, about 50 miles from home.

"We'll be out of here in a day or so," he said, drinking a hot soda. "We're very, very, very, very lucky."

His 13-year-old son Matthew doesn't think so. He's bored out of his mind. "I sleep," he said. "There's nothing else to do except sleep and walk the dogs."

His sister, Brittney, 11, was eating a breakfast of dry cereal with her fingers.

"We do other things," she countered.

Like what?

"We hit each other," she replied.

Her father admonished her. "At least we have a home to go to."

Rowe is pretty sure her home is gone. She lived in the back bay of Biloxi, near Highway 90, which was covered with water, debris and the hurricane-thrown remnants of the gulf's massive barge casinos.

"I have no job, and I probably have no house," she said, smiling bravely. "My husband has to see it before he believes it's gone. I just want to go West for a couple of weeks and regroup."

What will they do next?

"What can I do?" she asked. "I try to live in the present. What's gone – that's just material stuff."

Despite her words of optimism, Rowe's eyes filled with tears.

"It's a lot to take in," she said, and looked away. "It's really just overpowering."

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Katrina clobbers rich and poor in Pascagoula, from Lott's mansion to shotgun shacks

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By RUSS BYNUM

Associated Press Writer

PASCAGOULA, Miss. (AP) – The two-mile stretch of Beach Boulevard where waterfront mansions stood perched above the lapping gulf waters now resembles a million-dollar junkyard of shattered brick walls and white columns.

Poor people living further inland also felt the catastrophic fury of Hurricane Katrina, which sent floodwaters up to five-feet deep rushing into shotgun houses 1 1/2 miles from the beach.

Katrina clobbered the rich and poor alike in this Gulf Coast city of 25,000 near the Alabama state line. At least 15 people were reported killed by the storm in Pascagoula and surrounding Jackson County.

"We've been trying to dig and find some of our silver or anything we can salvage out of the ground," Opal Smith, 64, said as she and her husband, Greg, sat Wednesday surrounded by scattered golf clubs, kitchenware, shards of pottery and piles of bricks that used to be the back wall and garage of their 5,500-square-foot home.

Though the Smiths' home was built 15-feet above the water, the storm surge as Katrina crashed ashore Monday stripped most of the brick, doors, windows and sheetrock from the first floor of their house. Five white columns that survived out front framed a gaping hole exposing the stairway inside.

Their more-prominent neighbor – one of Mississippi's U.S. senators – fared no better.

"Trent Lott's house is down the street," said Greg Smith, 72, an insurance salesman. "There's not anything left."

"He's among the many who have losses and it has been a very emotional thing," Lott's press secretary, Susan Irby, said Wednesday.

At least eight homes along Beach Boulevard were ripped from their foundations, leaving nothing but concrete slabs and pilings scattered with debris. Others had shredded roofs sagging on buckled wood frames that had been stripped bare like skeletons.

Computer monitors, recliners and broken tables littered what were once manicured lawns. Muddy clothes and strips of insulation dangled from gnarled oaks trees.

Brian and Samantha Bosio found their small one-story home a block from the beach had been lifted by the storm and shifted five feet off its foundation. But at least they still had a home.

"His parents had a house on the beach. Now it's just cement studs," said Samantha Bosio, 23. "We don't even know where the house went."

Less than two miles away, Maggie Handford had ripped out the carpet in her small, tin-roofed house and was trying to determine how much of her water-logged furniture was ruined. Waste-deep floodwaters had swept into her home Monday as the 46-year-old rode out the storm with her 6-year-old grandson.

Sweating on her front porch, with no ice or electricity for air conditioning, Handford said she's hardly been able to sleep during the muggy nights despite being exhausted.

"You just have to fight to sleep, it's so hot," she said. "You can't leave the doors open because there's looting."

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Across the nation, residents opening homes to Katrina refugees

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By GREG BLUESTEIN

Associated Press Writer

ATLANTA (AP) – Every night since Hurricane Katrina pounded the Gulf Coast, Fredia Rainey has been glued to the tragic TV reports on the rising death toll and the thousands of people left homeless by the storm.

Finally, the worsening situation reached a tipping point in her mind. The least she could do, she figured, is make available a spare bedroom in her west Georgia home.

"I have space and people need help. That's just it," said Rainey, who is offering the bedroom for $1. "I can't just keep crying when I can reach out and help people."

Across the nation, people like Rainey are offering up their homes as temporary shelters to the storm's refugees. On the Web site craigslist.org, hundreds of people – some from as far as Oregon and New Hampshire – are eagerly offering free or extremely cheap room and board for victims, even knowing those strangers may stay for months.

"We've got all this room. Why not host a family, a couple, someone who needs help?" asked Linda Donewald, an empty-nester who is offering her Mesa, Ariz., home to refugees along with space for a pet cat or dog. "Even if it's 110 degrees, I'm sitting here on dry land. And these people have nothing."

The problem is that many of the victims can't see the listings. Most don't have computers or Internet access in the hotels, motels and emergency shelters where they've holed up across the South.

In Valdosta, Ga., five volunteers have offered up their homes, but city officials said there is no way – beyond a local media campaign – for victims to know about it. In the meantime, the city's hotel rooms are packed with refugees, and Red Cross volunteers are readying long-term shelters in the area.

Federal officials nonetheless applaud the efforts as a way for the average citizen to help in the wake of a disaster.

"That kind of system, individual to individual, is a great way to go," said David Passey, a spokesman with the Federal Emergency Management Agency. "There are a lot of great Americans out there."

Some of the more fortunate victims with Internet access were promptly able to find housing. Just 20 minutes after Brenda Moreshead posted an online message offering three bedrooms and a finished basement in her suburban Atlanta home to storm victims, she got a phone call from two sisters from New Orleans who were at a motel in Arkansas.

Moreshead expects them to arrive in Atlanta by Thursday. Her family, friends and co-workers have donated clothes, groceries and money to defray the costs of housing the sisters. She also hopes to help one of them land a job at a nearby preschool.

The women speak Spanish, and Moreshead's husband has been looking for someone to teach the language to the couple's 2-year-old son.

"I've been very blessed in my life," Moreshead said. "What goes around comes around."

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On The Net:

Craigslist: http://www.craigslist.org

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Doc: 00263056 DB: research–d–2005–3 Date: Wed Aug 31 15:37:01 2005

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Federal agencies rushing help to disaster

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By RANDOLPH E. SCHMID

Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) – The Bush administration declared a public health emergency for the entire Gulf Coast on Wednesday, pledging an unprecedented rescue-and-relief response to the devastation of Hurricane Katrina. They rushed food, medicine and water to victims.

"We will work tirelessly to ensure that our fellow citizens have the sustained support and the necessary aid to recover and reclaim their homes, their lives and their communities," Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said at a briefing.

Health and Human Services Secretary Michael Leavitt said his agency is concerned about potential disease outbreaks and was sending medical experts from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. He urged residents of the coastal area to boil water and follow food safety precautions as well as to avoid situations that might lead to carbon monoxide poisoning from electricity generators.

He also said that mental health personnel were being sent to the area.

Chertoff said: "The situation in all affected areas remains very dangerous."

Declaration of a public health emergency simplifies procedures the government must follow in awarding grants or contracts to help prevent or treat health threats. Money for this work comes from a public health emergency fund.

Transportation Secretary Norman Y. Mineta said his agency is working to restore highways, airports, seaports and oil pipelines in the region. And he said generators are being moved to pipeline pumping stations to restore the flow of oil to the region.

Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Stephen Johnson said anti-pollution standards for gasoline are being eased throughout the country until Sept. 15, a step expected to allay shortages.

"Then first stage is, of course, life saving," Chertoff said. "We've made a lot of progress in that respect."

A second stage is going to be to help people find shelter with food and water in safe conditions, he said, followed by assessing the damage and figuring out what needs to be done to begin repairs.

Chertoff said he couldn't estimate the number of deaths or the costs of the recovery effort.

Assistant Defense Secretary Paul McHale said the National Guard will assist local civilian authorities in law enforcement at the request of governors. The president can use active duty military to restore order, he said, but added that such a step isn't likely.

In what it said was its largest-ever mobilization, the Red Cross reported that more than 45,000 victims of Hurricane Katrina were housed in its shelters Wednesday and the number was growing steadily.

Some 250 shelters were open in the storm damaged area and the Red Cross set up 15 emergency kitchens capable of feeding 350,000 people, spokeswoman Deborah Daley said. "We are focused on providing the most elemental essentials ... food, shelter and water," she said.

Emergency response vehicles are also in the area providing food but they are operating from fixed bases since they cannot yet get into neighborhoods because of the damage, Daley said. She said it has been a major undertaking to get people and materials into the region and that it will take time.

"This is our largest mobilization in the history of the organization," she said.

Responding to suggestions that cruise ships might be used to assist storm victims, Christine Fischer, spokeswoman for the International Council of Cruise Lines, said the cruise lines are in talks with the government.

"It is a possibility," she said. "This is something that the cruise industry is exploring." But, she added, "We're trying to figure out if you're even able to get a ship up the river."

Meanwhile, the Federal Emergency Management Agency urged people who evacuated before the storm to stay where they are.

Michael D. Brown, head of FEMA said: "We need everyone's cooperation to keep passable roads clear and to prevent those returning from placing additional burdens on the limited shelter, food and water in the heavily impacted areas."

He said returning residents could face blocked and washed out roads, downed power lines across highways, unsafe road crossings due to flooding and many other dangers.

In other developments:

–The State Department said the New Orleans passport office, which handles 17 percent of the nation's passport applications, is closed. The agency is working to reroute new cases to other locations.

–The Transportation Department dispatched more than 400 trucks to move 5.4 million MREs (read-to-eat meals); 13.4 million liters of water; 10,400 tarps; 4,900 rolls of plastic sheeting; 3.4 million pounds of ice; 10 mobile homes; 144 generators; 20 containers of disaster supplies; 135,000 blankets; 11,000 cots; 200 tables; 450 chairs; 1 all-terrain vehicle; 19 forklifts and three 100-person and nine 50-person field office kits to flood damaged areas for FEMA.

–Eighteen Urban Search and Rescue task forces and two Incident Support Teams have been deployed and prepositioned in Shreveport, La., and Jackson, Miss., including teams from Florida, Indiana, Maryland, Missouri, Ohio, Tennessee, Texas, and Virginia. An additional eight swift water rescue teams have been deployed, FEMA said.

–The number of people rescued or assisted by the Coast Guard climbed to 1,250.

– The Defense Department's Transportation Command was flying eight swift- water rescue teams from California to Lafayette, La. These teams will provide approximately 14 highly trained personnel with vehicles and small rigid-hulled boats capable of rescuing stranded citizens from flooded areas.

–USS Bataan sailed to the waters off Louisiana to provide support. Four helicopters from the Bataan were flying medical evacuation and search and rescue missions in Louisiana. Bataan's hospital may also be used for medical support.

–The hospital ship USNS Comfort was departing Baltimore to bring medical assistance capabilities to the Gulf region, and should arrive in seven days.

–The Department of Health and Human Services said 250 mobile hospital beds and associated equipment have arrived at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge. Thirty-eight Public Health Service officers are at the facility and along with disaster medical assistance teams and State health care professionals.

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Phone outages persist; Some try Web forums

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By BRUCE MEYERSON

AP Business Writer

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Telephone outages persisted across Katrina's havoc-strewn path on Wednesday, frustrating people's efforts to locate family and friends and complicating rescue and relief operations.

Local lines and cellular service remained knocked out in the worst-hit areas, making it difficult or impossible for thousands of storm refugees to communicate with the outside world.

Outside the hurricane zone, some people resorted to posting messages on Web forums in a stab at contacting loved ones or finding out about damage to homes.

The central telephone building for New Orleans, built to withstand floods and hostile attacks, has remained operational throughout the storm and ensuing ordeal, capable of receiving calls and Internet traffic from outside the region.

The problem is that there's nowhere for most of those calls and bits of data to be sent once they arrive because local lines have been cut off by flooding and power failures.

BellSouth Corp., the dominant local phone provider for much of the region, estimated Wednesday that about 750,000 lines "in the most heavily damaged areas" may be out of service and that 180 central offices were running on back-up generators due to power outages.

Anecdotal reports from long-distance carriers who exchange traffic with local operators indicated that scores of network terminals responsible for routing calls to their final destinations were out of commission in areas served by BellSouth, Alltel Corp. and smaller independent phone companies.

The storm also revealed some quirks of how the telephone system works: Some Gulf Coast residents who had fled far away before the storm hit were finding that their cell phones could make calls but not receive them.

The problem affected only those whose cell phone numbers came with area codes from the affected region such as 504 for New Orleans.

Gary Morgenstern has been unable to dial the cell phones of his daughter or her boyfriend, both students at Tulane University, since Monday even though they evacuated from New Orleans late Saturday and have been driving west through Texas and Arizona.

As a result, Morgenstern's been sending text messages to her phone when he wants her to call so he can find out how they're doing.

"My daughter could be sitting next to me in New Jersey and I could be having the same problem," said Morgenstern, a public relations executive for AT&T Corp., noting that his daughter and boyfriend have different national providers.

Wireless industry experts said the problem revolves around basic network architecture.

Usually, when cell users take their phones outside their local area code, the wireless network checks back with a network computer in the home market to verify account information and let the service provider know where to route calls.

With communications to the home switch in New Orleans and nearby area codes cut off by the storm, cellular operators quickly made arrangements on their networks and with one another to automatically connect any calls dialed from one of those phones.

Incoming calls, however, can present a problem because the phone network can't determine where to route those calls without first checking in with the New Orleans switch to find out where the cell user is located.

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TV telethons announced for Katrina victims

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By LYNN ELBER

AP Television Writer

LOS ANGELES (AP) – Hurricane Katrina telethons reminiscent of benefits for tsunami and 9/11 victims were announced Wednesday with artists including Wynton Marsalis and Green Day, while Jerry Lewis' annual Labor Day fundraiser will join in as well.

Lewis said Wednesday his telethon for the Muscular Dystrophy Association would include celebrity appeals for hurricane relief. MDA also will donate $1 million to help victims in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama, he said.

"While the needs of `my kids' are with us all year-round, Hurricane Katrina is a national disaster on a scale that's difficult to comprehend," the actor-comedian said in a statement. "We simply couldn't ignore the need to help."

Celebrities will appeal for donations for hurricane victims during the first four hours of the telethon and its concluding four hours. The broadcast begins at 9 p.m. EDT Sunday and ends at 5:30 p.m. EDT Monday (check local listings for stations).

A special 800 phone number will be used for the Katrina donations, with proceeds going to the Salvation Army in the hard-hit states.

Hurricane relief efforts will be seen across a number of TV channels, which have been filled with images of tragedy and destruction caused by Katrina.

"A Concert for Hurricane Relief" will air on NBC, MSNBC and CNBC at 8 p.m. EDT Friday, NBC Universal Television Group announced Wednesday.

The hourlong special, hosted by "Today" show co-host Matt Lauer in New York, is scheduled to include performances by Marsalis, Harry Connick Jr. and Tim McGraw, all with ties to the affected areas, NBC said. Leonardo DiCaprio and other celebrities are expected to participate.

Viewers will be encouraged to donate to the American Red Cross Disaster Relief Fund.

Another aid effort was announced by MTV Networks, starting with a Saturday, Sept. 10, music special airing on MTV, VH1 and CMT and intended to raise funds for the American Red Cross and other organizations.

Besides Green Day, scheduled performers include Ludacris, Gretchen Wilson, Usher, Alicia Keys, John Mellencamp, the Dave Matthews Band, Rob Thomas, David Banner and Linkin Park's Chester Bennington.

The special also will be available on MTV2, mtvU and VH1 Classic, as well as broadband video networks MTV Overdrive and VSpot.

The concert is part of what MTV Networks said will be an ongoing effort by its outlets to promote volunteer efforts as well as fundraising.

Information was to go out immediately on how viewers may join in relief activities and donate clothes and other goods.

Also Wednesday, MTV Networks' parent company, Viacom, announced a $1 million donation to the American Red Cross and a worldwide matching gift program for employee donations. Other support efforts are planned by Viacom media properties including BET, CBS and UPN, the company said.

A 2001 telethon for victims of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks was carried on all major networks and drew nearly $130 million in donations.

In 2005, NBC Universal aired a benefit for victims of last December's earthquake-triggered tsunami that struck parts of Asia and Africa. It raised close to $20 million, NBC said.

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'Why did you do this to us?' Tragedy, triumph in Katrina's aftermath

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By ALLEN G. BREED

Associated Press Writer

NEW ORLEANS (AP) – Set down on dry land after three days cowering atop furniture in her flooded kitchen, 83-year-old Camille Fletcher stumbled a few feet and collapsed. She and two of her children had made it through Hurricane Katrina alive, but her Glendalyn with the long, beautiful black hair was gone.

"My precious daughter," Fletcher sobbed Wednesday. "I prayed to God to keep us safe in his loving care."

Then, looking into an incongruously blue sky, she whimpered: "You're supposed to be a loving God. You're supposed to love us. And what have you done to us? Why did you do this to us?"

But for the rescuers who plucked Fletcher and untold others from roofs, balconies and highways flooded by Hurricane Katrina, such questions were a luxury they simply could not afford.

Emergency officials say 72 hours is about the longest they can expect most people to last in the sweltering Louisiana heat. So they called in volunteers from across this "fisherman's paradise" to help improve the survivors' odds.

Ronnie Lovett and about 30 of his crew from R&R Construction drove four hours from Sulphur, La., to join the rescue effort. They arose with the sun Wednesday after spending the night in sleeping bags on the pavement outside Harrah's casino on the Mississippi River, because they couldn't find rooms.

Lovett is paying the men's wages and furnishing gas for their personal boats.

"They're all Bubbas, swamp men," said Lovett, who brought his own 21-foot fishing boat. "We're here for the duration, until they turn us loose."

At dawn, a motley armada of air boats, aluminum skiffs and even a two-seater Jet Ski moved out from the central business district. Heading east in the westbound lanes of Interstate 10, the boats passed the Superdome, where hundreds of ragged people stood on the hot pavement and helicopters buzzed around.

Many of the displaced had clearly spent the night on the highway rather than suffer the stable-like conditions of the sports stadium. The caravan passed people dragging suitcases and pushing shopping carts. One man waved an empty water jug like a railroad lantern, pleading for someone to stop and fill it.

After nearly an hour of zigzagging around downed lampposts and plowing through water up to past their wheel wells, the volunteer navy arrived at a staging point in New Orleans East, just south of Lake Pontchartrain.

New Orleans police Officer Martin Jules warned the men not to overload their boats. Some volunteers have had their rigs taken from them at gunpoint, so Jules also warned them not to be heroes.

"These people have been out here two or three days," he said, standing on the bow of a flatboat. "They're scared, they're tired, they're thirsty, they're hungry. If it gets hostile, we roll, OK? We're here to help 'em. We got to be here to help them for the next couple of months, however long it takes. Our safety is No. 1."

Within minutes of launching, the men were returning with sunken-eyed, sallow-skinned survivors.

Kevin Montgomery, 40, had spent the past three days shuttling between the attic of a one-story home and a makeshift canopy he built on the roof. He and two other men rationed a gallon of water between them.

"It was terrible," the carpenter said as he trundled through the gasoline-laced water.

Every once in a while, Mongtomery would see a body float by. But he cannot swim and had to fight the urge to wade in and tie them down.

"All I could do was pass them by and hope that God takes care of the rest of that," he said. "You have to think of self, too."

The boats circled a Day's Inn, where people had hung sheets on the balconies reading, "SOS." and "We need food and water." At Forest Tower, a high-rise senior citizens apartment complex, one man waved his empty oxygen tank out a window.

A boat floated through the building's shattered entrance and pulled right up to the stairs. Elderly residents stepped gingerly onto tables and into the boats.

Simon Queen, 68, said he slept through Hurricane Betsy. But Katrina was like "King Kong pounding at the windows."

"I need to get me to some high ground," he said. "I wasn't born with fins."

At the nearby United Medical Rehab Hospital, 14 patients, 11 staff members and their families awaited their saviors.

Nurse Bernadette Shine said the facility was nearly out of oxygen, and several diabetic patients had been without dialysis for nearly a week. After the fruit cocktail and peanut butter ran out, the staff broke into the candy and drink machines for sugary items to keep patients from going into shock.

"There are people that are not going to make it," Shine said, her voice cracking. "One I've known since I was 10 years old. But we did what we could for them. We did everything we could for them."

After several hours, a small fleet of rented moving trucks showed up to take the people to the downtown convention center so they could be taken out of the city. Police herded people up metal ramps like cattle into the unrefrigerated boxes.

Camille Fletcher sat forlorn, not really caring when it would be her turn. Suddenly, a woman emerged from the waters and began walking toward her. She had long, disheveled black hair.

"Mamma?" she shouted.

"Oh my god, oh my God," the old woman screamed, kissing Glendalyn's hand and pressing it against her forehead. "My daughter's alive!"

The 59-year-old Glendalyn Fletcher told her family a harrowing story of how she had floated through a wall at her house a mile away from her mother's and swum, stripped naked by the raging torrent, to a neighbor's house and cowered in an attic; how someone had picked them up Tuesday and left them stranded on a water-locked section of I-10.

"It was horrible, but there were millions of stars," the dehydrated woman said.

A few moments later, it was time for Camille Fletcher to go to a shelter. Before being helped into the back of the moving truck, she looked back at her daughter and smiled.

"God is good."

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EDITOR'S NOTE: Allen G. Breed is the AP's Southeast regional writer, based in Raleigh, N.C.

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Hurricane Katrina triggers memories, prayers in the tsunami zone

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By CHRIS BRUMMITT

Associated Press Writer

BANDA ACEH, Indonesia (AP) – For Nimal Premasiri, televised images of water surging into New Orleans triggered painful memories. He lost his wife and daughter just eight months ago when waves "big as elephants" crashed into a packed commuter train in Sri Lanka.

"God has made us equals in birth, life and death," Premasiri, 51, said Wednesday.

Though the Dec. 26 earthquake and tsunami was far more deadly than the disaster caused by Hurricane Katrina, many in Asian nations hardest hit by the killer waves – from Indonesia to Thailand and Sri Lanka – felt acute sympathy with Katrina's victims.

The hurricane flooded large parts of New Orleans and several other areas along the Gulf Coast, killing hundreds. Two levees also broke in New Orleans, spilling water into the streets and swamping the below-sea-level city.

Raju Danny, 26, who lost his wife to raging tsunami torrents in Indonesia, said he "felt tears welling up when I saw that so many people had died."

"I would like to help, but all I have is my prayers," the waiter said during a break from serving rice and fried chicken to customers in the seaside town of Banda Aceh.

More than 200,000 people were killed or missing after the tsunami, inspiring a massive international emergency response and a huge worldwide fund-raising drive.

People in Indonesia's Aceh province, which lost a staggering 130,000 people, recalled in particular the massive humanitarian effort undertaken by the U.S. military following the disaster.

Within days, U.S. choppers were dropping off water and emergency supplies to stranded villagers and collecting injured survivors.

"America helped us a lot, and they were genuine too," said Reza Saputra, a 19-year-old student. "One of their helicopters even crashed here."

In Sri Lanka, where the tsunami killed 31,000 and left tens of thousands homeless, several people also said pictures of the devastation caused by Katrina brought back vivid memories.

"When I see the images from Katrina, I can easily identify," said Chulie de Silva, a World Bank executive who lost her brother in the tsunami. "We were just (like) them on Dec. 26. At least they had warning; we had none."

"The lives of men, women, children were snuffed out in a few seconds," she said, recalling the look of agony on people's faces as the waves swept them away, and later, the stench of death.

"My brother lay on his back, no shirt, his handsome face peaceful," she said. "I pray and hope not many sisters" in the United States will suffer in the same way.

Many in India, where some 10,700 people died, also felt the pain caused by events unfolding a half a world away, said Barry Mackey, regional program manager in New Delhi for Habitat for Humanity, an international housing charity based in Americus, Ga.

"The people here are definitely watching news of Katrina, and since they had to respond to the tsunami just last year, they do sympathize with Katrina's victims," he said, predicting their sorrow would only magnify as the real death toll emerged.

But he said he did not think the disaster would mean a loss of promised funds for tsunami reconstruction in the island nation.

"We have loyal donors and the program will not suffer," he said.

Thailand saw some 7,000 dead or missing, including many foreign vacationers.

Yowalak Thiarachow, the country's program manager for the British humanitarian agency Oxfam, said relief workers and residents "saw the pictures of people being evacuated (in New Orleans) and we couldn't believe our eyes."

Though many here see the United States as more advanced, the devastation in New Orleans "shows Thai people and Americans are in the same boat," she said.

Still, Thiarachow noted, U.S. authorities are more capable when it comes to providing emergency assistance, so many victims will get needed help.

Prattana Nuntaratpun, who works for a Thai TV station, she had not heard of any of the station's viewers calling in to donate or write letters to people affected by Katrina.

"Thai people wouldn't react that way. It's too far from us," she said. "People probably aren't thinking as far as Katrina," she said.

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Vignettes from the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina

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NEW ORLEANS (AP) – Managers at two French Quarter hotels teamed up to hire 10 buses to carry their 500 guests to safer ground, but federal officials commandeered the vehicles and told the guests to go to the convention center with other evacuees, one of the managers said.

Peter Ambros, general manager of Astor Hotel at Astor Crowne Plaza, said Thursday the guests had been waiting on the street for the buses for more than four hours Wednesday night.

"We kept hearing they were coming, they were coming," said guest Bill Hedrick, a Houston oilman who was with family including his mother-in-law, who uses a walker.

He said he and the others had paid $45 a seat. When the crowd learned the buses would never arrive, "everyone was totally stunned," Hedrick said.

People were disappointed and angry, too – but not violent, he said.

Hedrick, who had moved to the New Orleans Convention Center along with Ambros and many of the other guests, had harsh words Thursday for city officials, who he said were focused on helping residents. "The tourists here are an afterthought," he said.

Lauren Helvie, 25, said her SUV was commandeered by police.

Helvie parked her Toyota Forerunner in the garage at the Ritz Carlton hotel in the French Quarter during the storm and returned to retrieve it Thursday. But police told her she wouldn't be getting her car.

"They said, 'What kind of car is it? A Forerunner? Then for sure you're not getting it back,'" Helvie said.

The police officer didn't explain anything to her, but she said the hotel manager told her police were using her car and others like it to evacuate elderly and ill out of the city.

As for Ambros, who saw his plans for heroism erupt, "you know, I'm an old dog. I stay cool. I just want to take care of my people," he said.

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KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) – Patients from a children's hospital in hurricane-devasted New Orleans have been transported to a Kansas City medical center in a quickly arranged deal between the hospitals' chief executive officers and a senator.

Tom McCormally, a spokesman for Children's Mercy Hospital of Kansas City, said the New Orleans hospital called Wednesday asking for accommodations as quickly as possible for patients and their families.

"They said not tomorrow, it needs to be today," McCormally said. "They were really anxious to get the children out of there to someplace safe and dry, away from the chaos."

Twenty-seven patients ranging from a few months to 20 years old arrived Wednesday night from New Orleans' Children's Hospital.

Their ailments included asthma, leukemia and kidney disease, with conditions ranging from fair to critical, McCormally said.

The two hospitals are not affiliated, but the CEOs are longtime friends.

McCormally said the hospital contacted the office of Sen. Kit Bond, R-Mo., which helped arrange for the Missouri Air National Guard to pick up the children in New Orleans.

"Now that I'm here I'm not afraid anymore," said Arnita Lister of Shreveport, La., who arrived with her 3-year-old son. She donated a kidney to him in February.

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TUSCALOOSA, Ala. (AP) – University of Alabama football fans were being asked to help hurricane refugees by giving up their hotel rooms this weekend to evacuees.

Hotels around Tuscaloosa are booked ahead of the school's football season opener Saturday night against Middle Tennessee, and those reservations could displace evacuees currently staying in the rooms, said the university's athletics director, Mal Moore.

Moore sent an e-mail Wednesday to more than 50,000 supporters and season-ticket holders, asking people with hotel reservations to cancel so evacuees from Louisiana, Alabama and Mississippi can have shelter.

"The human tragedy as a result of Katrina is staggering and I know Crimson Tide fans will do what they can to help those who are not able to immediately return to their homes," Moore said.

Alabama's Student Recreation Center is also serving as a Red Cross shelter for hundreds of evacuees.