Katrina Live Thread, Part X

Various ^ | 30 August 2005

[NautiNurse]

Catastrophic damage occurred to Mississippi, Louisiana and Alabama as a result of Hurricane Katrina. Major bridges are destroyed. Mobile AL suffered its worst flooding in 90 years. In New Orleans, a large section of concrete levee broke last night. Water continues to rise, threatening, among many things, Tulane Hospital with 1000 patients. New Orleans officials: Do not attempt to return to the city at this time if you evacuated. It is too dangerous.

Sun-Herald Gulfport MS

WLOX TV Biloxi, Gulfport, Pascagula

Gulfport News via Topix.net WAFB Baton Rouge

Slidell, Mandeville, and Covington Updates Warning: website is overloaded due to heavy traffic

Mobile Register via al.com

Mississippi updates via Jackson Ledger

Lafayette LA Daily Advertiser

Pensacola News Journal

[mewzilla]

Click here for the official website of the U.S.S. Bataan.

God bless our servicemen and women.

[cajungirl]

are you sure, it is I10 going east out of NO, I knew that was gone but this looked like the ponchatrain causeway.

[TonyInOhio]

FEMA news conference supposed to be aired shortly.

[NautiNurse]

I admit I didn't have the volume up - but the only bridge I know that long is Ponchartrain.

[mewzilla]

It was the twin span, I10, between NO and Slidell.

[Not A Snowbird]

What are you responding to? Has that bridge come apart?

There was video earlier... the bridge is in pieces. Some pieces have fallen into the lake, others have just come apart. Looks like San Francisco in 1989.

[Howlin]

How can it be passable when whole sections are missing?

[jeffers]

"To: jeffers; Dog Gone; Dark Wing; El Laton Caliente; Daus; randita
This is the big economic hit - temporary cessation of major shipping - perhaps almost all shipping - through the Mississippi Delta to the Gulf of Mexico.

A truly gargantuan proportion of our GDP depends upon this.

Plus loss of the Delta underground/undersea pipelines for crude oil and refined petroleum products due to earth and mud movements. That was a significant problem with the last major hurricane through this
area. The problem is likely bigger now, but rebuilding of those pipelines will be slowed by higher priority demands due to all the other damage this time.

But the shipping issue is the biggie."

Yes, the Mississippi River is closed for the forseeable future, and that logistical supply load will have to be shouldered elsewhere. This, along with oil prices, are the big economic issues. I think Wall Street will...address...this issue over the next few days.

My other major concerns are the body count, which could go higher than forecast, and the River levees, watching for news of those like a hawk.

[nuclady]

Well, after all these posts, I finally looked up "nutria." No wonder the wetlands and marshlands are disappearing!! Are there any programs to bait/kill these critters that are obviously doing so much damage? I can't see prople eating these things, my Lord, they are rodents! Ack....

[LibWrangler]

Thanks for that unbiased opinion, She...erm, Chev.

[ContemptofCourt]

If today's spike persists, the economy is going to feel it.

[AaronInCarolina]

The industrial canal connects the river with the lake. From what others have posted, the river is higher than the lake.

From maps.google.com it looks like there is a canal lock between the point of the breach and the Mississippi River, so the level of the canal at the point of the breach should be at the lake level. However, the lock could presumably have been overwhelmed and the river may be flowing through the breach.

[cajungirl]

That is bad enough. The Ponchatrain causeway is the worst thing I have driven across except for that horrid bridge into Charleston. That Causeway is terrifying for me, I cannot look at the water going over it, have to watch the front of the car.

[nicmarlo]

yes, the one; I have posted, numerous times, it's one thing to take food/water, and I have posted more numerously, how wrong it is to be stealing t.v.'s, 10 prs. of jeans, and jewelry....but I get called a creep for condemning the looters....those are the ones who cannot follow along.

[najida]

Big FUGLY rats at that.

[NautiNurse]

I agree it looked like the Ponchartrain Causeway.

[Arizona Carolyn]

On the other hand, I'm from the South and I do like most blacks I've met. I have Southern friends who are not biggots. I envy black people their strong faith, especially in light of the plight many have in life.

There isn't room here to get into what affect the family dynamic has had on tearing apart black families, and I think they need more Bill Cosby's and fewer Jackson's who will tell them the truth instead of what they like to hear

What I dislike is bigotry of any kind... or people who feel sorry for themselves instead of trying to get an education to pull themselves up by the bootstraps. Sometimes you need to throw a cold glass of water on the situation and tell people to wake up and do something to help themselves... and that is my complaint. I don't think some of the whites would look at them in disgust and call them names if they saw people really trying to help themselves instead of giving up.

So flame away at me as well, but we all have it tough at times in our lives, it's what we make of it that builds character and self-respect. Looting doesn't build self-respect (IMHO)

[r9etb]

Nic, nobody -- not even Dave -- is saying that looting is not going on. Of course there is looting, and it's a bad thing.

But there are also cases where it's a choice between taking something, and dying. Is that "looting" in the same sense as the jackals taking jewelry? Of course not.

You'd take some things, too, if your alternative was to have, say, your diabetic kid die because he didn't have insulin. Dave is simply pointing out that there's a distinction that can be made about these sorts of things.

Can you drop it now?

[rwfromkansas]

The looters are just being what human nature is at our evil core.

Hopefully they will be shaken back to reality soon.

[Steve_Seattle]

"It [Lake Pontchartrain Bridge]has come apart, I couldn't believe the pics as I heard it was passable by emergency vehicles. Sections of it are crumbled."

You're screen name suggests you know whereof you speak about NO landmarks, and that you aren't referring to the other bridge (I-10) that failed some time ago? (Sorry, just double-checking; there's so much confusion about all this.)