Stranded New Orleans residents evacuate the hurricane-ravaged city of New Orleans yesterday. Hellish scenes of death, damage and chaos wracked the U.S. Gulf Coast yesterday as overwhelmed authorities tried to rescue the living and count the dead amid the destruction left by powerful Hurricane Katrina. - REUTERS
NEW ORLEANS, (Reuters):
AUTHORITIES BEGAN to evacuate about 23,000 refugees from the New Orleans Superdome arena yesterday, and U.S. President George W. Bush said it would take years to recover from the flooding and devastation sown by Hurricane Katrina.
"We are dealing with one of the worst natural disasters in our nation's history," Bush said after returning early to the White House from his Texas vacation to oversee recovery efforts.
"This recovery will take a long time. This recovery will take years," he said. More than 78,000 people were in emergency shelters, and tens of thousands of homes and businesses were beyond repair, the president said.
GROWING DESPERATE
In New Orleans, a fleet of prison buses arrived at the storm-battered stadium to ferry refugees to the Houston Astrodome 350 miles (550 km) away. Stranded people were running out of food and water and growing desperate. Some pushed shopping carts filled with their belongings along freeways; one cart held a young girl who had passed out.
Looting erupted as people broke into stores to grab supplies, television sets, jewellery, clothes and computers. "It's a lot of chaos right now," Louisiana state police Director H.L. Whitehorn said.
Katrina's death toll was more than 200, but efforts to count the dead took a back seat to assisting survivors.
The Bush administration declared a public-health emergency in the region and the Pentagon ordered 10,000 more National Guard troops to Louisiana and Mississippi for storm relief, bringing to 21,000 the total deployed in four hurricane-battered states.
The administration also said it would release oil from strategic reserves to offset losses in the Gulf of Mexico, where the storm had shut down production, and it relaxed anti-pollution fuel standards with an aim toward making more gasoline and diesel available.
Katrina struck Louisiana on Monday with 140 mph (225 kph) winds, while slamming into the coasts of neighbouring Mississippi, Alabama and western Florida.
More than 200 people died in Mississippi, which was inundated by a 30-foot (10-metre) storm surge.
Some corpses were under too much rubble to safely collect, and two lay partly exposed to the hot sun in the remnants of a seaside apartment building in Biloxi, Mississippi.
"We don't know what we're going to do with them. It just leaves you numb," said hearse driver Jakel Marshall.
U.S. Senator Mary Landrieu told reporters she had heard at least 50 to 100 people were dead in New Orleans.
Louisiana officials said 3,000 people had been rescued, but many more waited to be picked up in boats that cruised flooded streets or helicopters that buzzed overhead.
New Orleans was flooded after the raging waters of Lake Pontchartrain tore holes in the levees that protect the low-lying city, then slowly filled it up.
Attempts had failed on Tuesday to plug a 200-foot (60-metre ) gap with sandbags and concrete barriers, but officials said they would keep trying.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers planned to try to fill the breach with giant 3,000-pound (1,400-kg) sandbags.
The lake should return to normal levels within about 36 hours, and the water now flooding New Orleans would begin to drain, said U.S. Army Corps of Engineers senior project engineer Al Naomi.
But New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin estimated it would be 12 to 16 weeks before residents could return. The floods knocked out electricity, contaminated the water supply and cut off most highway routes into the city.
A million people fled the New Orleans area before Katrina arrived. But former Mayor Sidney Barthelemy estimated 80,000 were trapped in the city.
GUNS IN HAND
The U.S. military was sending a hospital ship and two helicopter-carriers to assist two other Navy ships already conducting rescues in the area.
Amid the looting, gun-toting citizens took to the streets to try to restore order. A store owner put up a sign reading: 'You loot, I shoot.'
Police said there were dozens of carjackings overnight, by desperate survivors trying to leave town or obtain supplies. Somebody fired at a rescue helicopter Tuesday night, a state official said.
Katrina knocked out electricity to about 2.3 million customers, or nearly five million people, in four states, utility companies said. Restoring power could take weeks, they warned.
