For days after 9/11, people still tried to have the death toll at 20,000+. I would be very surprised to see the death toll on the Gulf Coast to rise to the levels being bandied about.
"For days after 9/11, people still tried to have the death toll at 20,000+."
Ohmigosh, that is so true. The first day we thought it might be 40,000, since that were how many people were in the WTC everyday. That was one of the few bright spots in the weeks afterward, watching that death count go down and down.
In fact, months and months later my friend who coincidentaly lived at that time in NOLA, STILL thought tens of thousands had died on 9/11 in NYC. The dropping numbers were not such a big story out of town it seems.