Posted on 09/01/2005 5:57:30 PM PDT by Uncle Joe Cannon
New Orleans in Anarchy With Fights, Rapes
Friday September 2, 2005 12:46 AM
AP Photo MSDP112
By ALLEN G. BREED
Associated Press Writer
NEW ORLEANS (AP) - New Orleans descended into anarchy Thursday, as corpses lay abandoned in street medians, fights and fires broke out and storm survivors battled for seats on the buses that would carry them away from the chaos. The tired and hungry seethed, saying they had been forsaken. ``This is a desperate SOS,'' mayor Ray Nagin said.
``We are out here like pure animals,'' the Rev. Issac Clark said outside the New Orleans Convention Center, where he and other evacuees had been waiting for buses for days amid the filth and the dead.
``I'm not sure I'm going to get out of here alive,'' said tourist Larry Mitzel of Saskatoon, Canada, who handed a reporter his business card in case he goes missing. ``I'm scared of riots. I'm scared of the locals. We might get caught in the crossfire.''
Four days after Hurricane Katrina roared in with a devastating blow that inflicted potentially thousands of deaths, the frustration, fear and anger mounted, despite the promise of 1,400 National Guardsmen a day to stop the looting, plans for a $10 billion recovery bill in Congress and a government relief effort President Bush called the biggest in U.S. history.
New Orleans' top emergency management official called that effort a ``national disgrace'' and questioned when reinforcements would actually reach the increasingly lawless city.
About 15,000 to 20,000 people who had taken shelter at New Orleans convention center grew increasingly hostile after waiting for buses for days amid the filth and the dead. Police Chief Eddie Compass said he sent in 88 officers to quell the situation at the building, but they were quickly driven back by an angry mob.
``We have individuals who are getting raped, we have individuals who are getting beaten,'' Compass said. ``Tourists are walking in that direction and they are getting preyed upon.''
A military helicopter tried to land at the convention center several times to drop off food and water. But the rushing crowd forced the choppers to back off. Troopers then tossed the supplies to the crowd from 10 feet off the ground and flew away.
In hopes of defusing the situation at the convention center, Mayor Ray Nagin gave the refugees permission to march across a bridge to the city's unflooded west bank for whatever relief they could find. But the bedlam made that difficult.
``This is a desperate SOS,'' Nagin said in a statement. ``Right now we are out of resources at the convention center and don't anticipate enough buses.''
At least seven bodies were scattered outside the convention center, a makeshift staging area for those rescued from rooftops, attics and highways. The sidewalks were packed with people without food, water or medical care, and with no sign of law enforcement.
An old man in a chaise lounge lay dead in a grassy median as hungry babies wailed around him. Around the corner, an elderly woman lay dead in her wheelchair, covered up by a blanket, and another body lay beside her wrapped in a sheet.
``I don't treat my dog like that,'' 47-year-old Daniel Edwards said as he pointed at the woman in the wheelchair.
``You can do everything for other countries, but you can't do nothing for your own people,'' he added. ``You can go overseas with the military, but you can't get them down here.''
The street outside the center, above the floodwaters, smelled of urine and feces, and was choked with dirty diapers, old bottles and garbage.
``They've been teasing us with buses for four days,'' Edwards said. ``They're telling us they're going to come get us one day, and then they don't show up.''
Every so often, an armored state police vehicle cruised in front of the convention center with four or five officers in riot gear with automatic weapons. But there was no sign of help from the National Guard.
At one point the crowd began to chant ``We want help! We want help!'' Later, a woman, screaming, went on the front steps of the convention center and led the crowd in reciting the 23rd Psalm, ``The Lord is my shepherd ...''
``We are out here like pure animals,'' the Issac Clark said.
``We've got people dying out here - two babies have died, a woman died, a man died,'' said Helen Cheek. ``We haven't had no food, we haven't had no water, we haven't had nothing. They just brought us here and dropped us.''
Tourist Debbie Durso of Washington, Mich., said she asked a police officer for assistance and his response was, ``'Go to hell - it's every man for himself.'''
``This is just insanity,'' she said. ``We have no food, no water ... all these trucks and buses go by and they do nothing but wave.''
At the hot and stinking Superdome, where 30,000 were being evacuated by bus to the Houston Astrodome, fistfights and fires erupted amid a seething sea of tense, suffering people who waited in a lines that stretched a half-mile to board yellow school buses.
After a traffic jam kept buses from arriving for nearly four hours, a near-riot broke out in the scramble to get on the buses that finally did show up, with a group of refugees breaking through a line of heavily armed National Guardsmen.
One military policeman was shot in the leg as he and a man scuffled for the MP's rifle, police Capt. Ernie Demmo said. The man was arrested.
Some of those among the mostly poor crowd had been in the dome for four days without air conditioning, working toilets or a place to bathe. An ambulance service airlifting the sick and injured out of the Superdome suspended flights as too dangerous after it was reported that a bullet was fired at a military helicopter.
``If they're just taking us anywhere, just anywhere, I say praise God,'' said refugee John Phillip. ``Nothing could be worse than what we've been through.''
By Thursday evening, 11 hours after the military began evacuating the Superdome, the arena held 10,000 more people than it did at dawn. National Guard Capt. John Pollard said evacuees from around the city poured into the Superdome and swelled the crowd to about 30,000 because they believed the arena was the best place to get a ride out of town.
As he watched a line snaking for blocks through ankle-deep waters, New Orleans' emergency operations chief Terry Ebbert blamed the inadequate response on the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
``This is not a FEMA operation. I haven't seen a single FEMA guy,'' he said. He added: ``We can send massive amounts of aid to tsunami victims, but we can't bail out the city of New Orleans.''
FEMA officials said some operations had to be suspended in areas where gunfire has broken out.
A day after Nagin took 1,500 police officers off search-and-rescue duty to try to restore order in the streets, there were continued reports of looting, shootings, gunfire and carjackings - and not all the crimes were driven by greed.
When some hospitals try to airlift patients, Coast Guard Lt. Cmdr. Cheri Ben-Iesan said, ``there are people just taking potshots at police and at helicopters, telling them, `You better come get my family.'''
Outside a looted Rite-Aid drugstore, some people were anxious to show they needed what they were taking. A gray-haired man who would not give his name pulled up his T-shirt to show a surgery scar and explained that he needs pads for incontinence.
``I'm a Christian. I feel bad going in there,'' he said.
Earl Baker carried toothpaste, toothbrushes and deodorant. ``Look, I'm only getting necessities,'' he said. ``All of this is personal hygiene. I ain't getting nothing to get drunk or high with.''
While floodwaters in the city appeared to stabilize, efforts continued to plug three breaches that had opened up in the levee system that protects this below-sea-level city.
Helicopters dropped sandbags into the breach and pilings were being pounded into the mouth of the canal Thursday to close its connection to Lake Pontchartrain, state Transportation Secretary Johnny Bradberry said. He said contractors had completed building a rock road to let heavy equipment roll to the area by midnight.
The next step called for using about 250 concrete road barriers to seal the gap.
In Washington, the White House said Bush will tour the devastated Gulf Coast region on Friday and has asked his father, former President George H.W. Bush, and former President Clinton to lead a private fund-raising campaign for victims.
The president urged a crackdown on the lawlessness.
``I think there ought to be zero tolerance of people breaking the law during an emergency such as this - whether it be looting, or price gouging at the gasoline pump, or taking advantage of charitable giving or insurance fraud,'' Bush said. ``And I've made that clear to our attorney general. The citizens ought to be working together.''
Donald Dudley, a 55-year-old New Orleans seafood merchant, complained that when he and other hungry refugees broke into the kitchen of the convention center and tried to prepare food, the National Guard chased them away.
``They pulled guns and told us we had to leave that kitchen or they would blow our damn brains out,'' he said. ``We don't want their help. Give us some vehicles and we'll get ourselves out of here!''
----
RUN CHRIS RUN!!!
I'm from the Bronx, NY. My survival skills are a bit different than yours, but I concede I wish I knew more of yours.
If you knew the extent of the disaster he inherited you wouldnt call him merely competant.
Guess you missed the hundreds of news reports that explained about those "poor unfortunate people". Apparently many of them are "poor, unforunate people" who could not evacuate. No transportation, no money, etc. It was all over the news before Katrina even hit and since then as well. And of course there's the old folks, hospital patients, and newborn babies. Dang it, guess they just didn't get their acts together.
that was a nice funny retort in a sea of depair and depravity the worst I've seen in the US
Welcome to the Jungle!...?
I can't help but curse the fact that the "victims" here were denied ONE important right in this catastrophe.
***AMENDMENT # 2***
Curse Socialism
Curse Liberalism
Curse Pacifism
Curse "Disarmament"
Curse "gun-control"
Curse the "legal" socialist concept of "Civil Rights"
Curse the "New Deal"
Curse the "Great Society"
Curse Welfare
Curse the misuse of the G*D given gift of FREE WILL!!!
G*D BLESS AMERICA!!!!
We WILL be a stronger people after this. We now have a clear picture of what riteous civilized people face in the years to come.
NEVER allow ourselves to be disarmed.
RICH
POOR
BLACK
YELLOW
WHITE
EAST
WEST
STRONG
WEEK
FULL
EMPTY
Once we lay down and prostrate ourselves in front of evil.
Once we accept appeasement as a compromise for "PEACE" sake.
Once we deny the wisdom of an individuals right to keep and bear ARMS....we are helpless in the face of evil.
WE LOSE.
G*D please accept our raped and murdered brothers and sisters that we (as this new "GREAT" society) willfully sacrificed. We adopting this socialist liberal mentality that has enslaved and blinded us "en mass".
I pray not only for the soul of the fallen unarmed soldier, I pray for "we" that sent that disarmed soldier into battle.
IN the name of the FATHER, SON and HOLY SPIRIT!!! Let us NOT continue down this road.
G*D bless the RED, white and blue...
Fuel space and time,
There is a limited amount of fuel in place, a limited amount of space to land at and our largest helicopters can't carry any more then a bus load of people.
By the weekend the really big ones will be off the coast on Navy ships full of supplies. They left Norfolk Virgina as soon as they were fully loaded and are steaming at full speed towards New Orleans.
Now when you figure out how to airlift an aircraft carrier around the world or from Norfolk to New Orleans in a few hours let us all know.
Sir, I have spent 21 of my 29 years in and around NYC. I know of what I am speaking.
My accent alone would bar me from National Office. I look like TAZ from ECW as it is!
Man, if only somebody would pass concealed carry in NYC...
Hon there was a hurricane. They can't find several oil rigs let alone boats. I don't think any boats survived. The ones that did are in use on the streets of NO already.
You have to admit, Dinkins was terrible!
Yep, those stupid tourists. Didn't they realize that all flights would be cancelled on the day they were supposed to fly home? Didn't they realize that all rental cars would be unavailable? I sure would have thought they would have taken their 20/20 vision with them on vacation, and also thought to pack their ESP. Oh yes, no sympathy for them. Who cares that it's someone's grandma and grandpa, or parents, or kids. Let 'em suffer and die for their bad planning. ;(
I forgot to tell you that Charity Hospital is surrounded by armed thugs. They said about 100. The head of one of the hospitals was on O'Reilly and he said they've been stormed by armed bands several times. It is chaos there.
The Dink was part of the Dem machine, elected because folks in Manhattan and Forest Hills felt guilty about what happened in Bensonhurst and Howard Beach. Here in Seattle, we have Greg Nickles, the white David Dinkens, who is only lucky because he presides over a city largely inhabited by latte sipping yuppies and gays.
I remember the depth of NYC during Dinkins. It was terrible.
"Where did they all go??????"
Miles inland
Hip-hop culture USA. How much money has P Diddy contributed thus far. They're killing us, and it will one day be chaos across our country.
I'm not calling anyone names. This is a complex situation and the blame can be spread very far.
If the effing (sorry, I'm extremely disgusted) mayor and governor had any leadership qualities at all mandatory evacuation would have been ordered on Friday. Those schoolbuses sitting in water could have been used. Buses from all over the state could have been commandeered. Every car in the city could have been filled with people. Trains have been mentioned.
If that had happened, very little of this would be happening.
And if each individual who had a few bucks and two working feet had taken the threat of hurricane seriously, he or she could have left the city even before the mandatory [sic] evacuation was ordered SUNDAY MORNING.
I was a single parent for some time and I know what incredible hardship and poverty are first hand. I would have left that stinking city on foot if need be in time to save myself and my children even if I had to carry them both piggyback.
I know that many were too old or otherwise handicapped, or had helpless people to care for. I certainly don't agree with "every man for himself" - the gov't should be there to assist and LEAD in a natural disaster. But those can help themselves, should have.
If I, living far away on the west coast, knew beforehand what would happen to NOLA in a bad hurricane (and I did), why the hell did people who live their whole lives in the city not know?
I went to a place in Brooklyn to eat called Casa Calamari. What a bunch of cafones!
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