Damn...they shut the roads in Texas.
Flood waters still rising, Red Cross expects "largest recovery operaton" ever
By Mark Schleifstein
Staff writer
Federal Emergency Management Agency spokesman Marty Bahamond, stationed at the New Orleans Emergency Operations Center, said a 100-to-200-meter section of levee and wall failed on the eastern side of the 17th Street Canal at the Hammond Highway bridge, which connects Buck Town in Metairie and West Lakeview in New Orleans.
Bahamond said the breach is a major factor in flooding that now covers an area bounded by the 17th Street Canal, the Industrial Canal and Interstate 10, and is spreading.
Areas flooded include the neighborhoods of Gentilly, Lakeview, City Park and Mid City, he said.
Determining exactly where the water from the 17th Street Canal is going is difficult, but its causing floodwaters to rise in that entire area late Monday.
Inspecting by helicopter, it was difficult to make out major city landmarks. “I didn’t know it was the airport,” he said, when his pilot pointed out Lakefront Airport, completely under water.
The Southern Yacht Club in West End Park also has burned down, he said.
Meanwhile, Margaret O’Brien-Molina, a spokesman for the American Red Cross Southwest Service Area office in Houston said national agency executives earlier Monday described Katrina as “the largest recovery operation the Red Cross has ever attempted.”
Red Cross officials are staging volunteers, food, cleaning supplies and other rescue equipment in Texas, Arkansas and Alabama in anticipation of moving it into the New Orleans area over the next few days.
She said there were an estimated 37,400 evacuees in shelters in Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida as of 3 p.m. Monday and thousands more were expected to join them.
Outside of the devastation in New Orleans, officials still don’t have a handle on the destruction caused on the Mississippi Gulf Coast, where news organizations are reporting that the combination of storm surge and reached 33 feet, as high or higher than the surge from Hurricane Camille in 1969.
In Texas, she said, state officials shut off interstate highways re-entering Louisiana to keep people from returning to flooded areas.
“I-10 is completely closed down,” she said. “No one can go back in and we have to find them a place to stay.”
Those who evacuated should expect to stay away for at least two days, O’Brien-Molina said.
Officials are working to identify sites to set up 25 emergency kitchens to be run by Southern Baptist volunteers, which will serve an initial 500,000 meals in coming days, she said. The Spirit of America and Henry’s Kitchen organizations also will set up 18-wheel mobile kitchens.
The volunteer agency has 166 emergency response vehicles and mobile feeding units on the way, and 288,000 “heater” meals, which are chemically heated when opened, are also en route. Another 150,000 will be on their way to Baton Rouge in the next few days.
Thousands of clean-up kits with bleach and mops also are being stationed in Alabama and Houston for shipment to New Orleans when possible, she said.
What????
What?
Is that woman on CNN speaking live?
She said the water around her hospital has been rising an inch ever five minutes and that they had NO water after the storm and now she has six feet around her?
They are contemplating AIRLIFTING 1000 patients out of Tulane Hospital!
Have to. There's no good reason for any residents to return at the moment - you can't get into the city or the other affected areas, and right now I-10 is desperately needed for emergency and relief vehicles.
I suspect that they're going to be using the "inherent runway" capability of the Eisenhower Interstate System designs in the area.