Hurricane Katrina brings death, floods to US Gulf

By Mark Wallheiser

BILOXI, Mississippi (Reuters) – A widespread disaster
unfolded on the U.S. Gulf coast on Tuesday as at least 50
people were reported dead in Mississippi and flood waters
poured into low-lying New Orleans through levees battered by
powerful Hurricane Katrina.

The death toll was expected to grow as rescuers struggled
through high water and mountains of debris to reach areas
devastated by Katrina when it struck the region on Monday.

The killer storm inflicted catastrophic damage all along
the coast as it slammed into Louisiana with 140 mile per hour
(224 kph) winds, then swept across Mississippi, Alabama and
western Florida.

It left a trail of shattered buildings, broken boats,
smashed cars, toppled trees and flooded cities. Risk analysts
estimated the storm would cost $26 billion, the most in U.S.
history.

In Mississippi, officials told newspapers at least 50
people were known dead in that state.

Harrison County Emergency Management spokesman Jim Pollard
told the Jackson, Miss., Clarion Ledger that 30 of them died at
a Biloxi apartment complex where they were drowned or crushed
by debris.

Most of the deaths appear to have been caused by a massive
storm surge that swept in from the sea and as far as a mile

inland in parts of Mississippi.

“The state has suffered a grievous blow on the coast,”
Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour told reporters.

The storm brought back memories of Hurricane Camille, which
hit the region in 1969 with winds up to 200 mph (320 kph) and
killed 256 people.

Before striking the Gulf coast, Katrina last week hit
southern Florida, where it killed seven people.

No deaths have been officially confirmed in Louisiana, but
New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin said bodies were floating in high
waters that covered most of the city.

“My heart is heavy tonight. I don’t have any good news to
really share,” he told television station WWL.

“The city of New Orleans is in a state of devastation. We
probably have 80 percent of our city under water, with some
sections of our city the water is as deep as 20 feet (6
metres). We still have many of our residents on roofs,” he
said. “Both airports are under water.”

New Orleans is mostly below sea level and protected by
levees or embankments.

STORM SURGE

Nagin said the levees had given way in places to Katrina’s
storm surge, including a 200-foot (60 meter) breach near the
city center through which waters from Lake Pontchartrain were
pouring in.

“There’s a serious leak and it’s causing the water to
continue to rise,” he said. Adding to the problem were
malfunctions in the vast pumping system the city uses to pump
flood waters out.

So far, Nagin said, the historic French Quarter and central
business district had not been badly flooded.

But Tulane University Medical Center vice president Karen
Troyer-Caraway told CNN the downtown hospital was surrounded by
six feet of water and considering evacuating its 1,000
patients.

“The water is rising so fast I cannot begin to describe how
quickly it’s rising,” she said. “We have whitecaps on Canal
Street, the water is moving so fast.”

Louisiana emergency preparedness officials said plans were
in the works to fix the broken levee.

The high waters flooded thousands of homes and forced many
people into their attics and on to their roofs.

Police took boats into flood stricken areas to rescue some
of the stranded, while others were picked up by helicopter.

People used axes and in at least one case a shot gun to
blast holes in roofs so they could escape their attics. Many
who had not yet been rescued could be heard screaming for help,
police said.

“This is a horror story. I’d rather be reading it somewhere
else than living it,” said Aaron Broussard, president of New
Orleans’ Jefferson Parish.

Katrina knocked out electricity to about 1.3 million
people, in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida, utility
companies said. Restoring power could take weeks, they warned.

On its way to the coast, the storm swept through oil and
gas fields in the Gulf of Mexico where 20 percent of the
nation’s energy is produced.

At least two drilling rigs were knocked adrift in the gulf
and another in Mobile Bay, Alabama, broke free of its mooring
and slammed into a bridge.

U.S. oil prices on Monday jumped nearly $5 a barrel in
opening trade to peak over $70 and on Tuesday was holding above
$68 as oil firms assessed damage from the hurricane.

By Tuesday morning, Katrina had moved inland to
northeastern Mississippi where the National Hurricane Center in
Miami said it was downgraded to a tropical storm with 50 mph
(80 kph) winds.