Hurricane Katrina brings death, floods to US Gulf
(Reuters)
Updated: 2005-08-30 22:00

A widespread disaster unfolded on the U.S. Gulf coast on Tuesday as at least 50 people were reported dead in Mississippi and flood waters poured into low-lying New Orleans through levees battered by powerful Hurricane Katrina.

The death toll was expected to grow as rescuers struggled through high water and mountains of debris to reach areas devastated by Katrina when it struck the region on Monday.

The killer storm inflicted catastrophic damage all along the coast as it slammed into Louisiana with 140 mile per hour (224 kph) winds, then swept across Mississippi, Alabama and western Florida.

It left a trail of shattered buildings, broken boats, smashed cars, toppled trees and flooded cities. Risk analysts estimated the storm would cost $26 billion, the most in U.S. history.

In Mississippi, officials told newspapers at least 50 people were known dead in that state.

Harrison County Emergency Management spokesman Jim Pollard told the Jackson, Miss., Clarion Ledger that 30 of them died at a Biloxi apartment complex where they were drowned or crushed by debris.

Most of the deaths appear to have been caused by a massive storm surge that swept in from the sea and as far as a mile

inland in parts of Mississippi.

"The state has suffered a grievous blow on the coast," Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour told reporters.

The storm brought back memories of Hurricane Camille, which hit the region in 1969 with winds up to 200 mph (320 kph) and killed 256 people.

Before striking the Gulf coast, Katrina last week hit southern Florida, where it killed seven people.

No deaths have been officially confirmed in Louisiana, but New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin said bodies were floating in high waters that covered most of the city.

"My heart is heavy tonight. I don't have any good news to really share," he told television station WWL.

"The city of New Orleans is in a state of devastation. We probably have 80 percent of our city under water, with some sections of our city the water is as deep as 20 feet (6 metres). We still have many of our residents on roofs," he said. "Both airports are under water."

New Orleans is mostly below sea level and protected by levees or embankments.

STORM SURGE

Nagin said the levees had given way in places to Katrina's storm surge, including a 200-foot (60 meter) breach near the city center through which waters from Lake Pontchartrain were pouring in.

"There's a serious leak and it's causing the water to continue to rise," he said. Adding to the problem were malfunctions in the vast pumping system the city uses to pump flood waters out.

So far, Nagin said, the historic French Quarter and central business district had not been badly flooded.

But Tulane University Medical Center vice president Karen Troyer-Caraway told CNN the downtown hospital was surrounded by six feet of water and considering evacuating its 1,000 patients.

"The water is rising so fast I cannot begin to describe how quickly it's rising," she said. "We have whitecaps on Canal Street, the water is moving so fast."

Louisiana emergency preparedness officials said plans were in the works to fix the broken levee.

The high waters flooded thousands of homes and forced many people into their attics and on to their roofs.

Police took boats into flood stricken areas to rescue some of the stranded, while others were picked up by helicopter.

People used axes and in at least one case a shot gun to blast holes in roofs so they could escape their attics. Many who had not yet been rescued could be heard screaming for help, police said.

"This is a horror story. I'd rather be reading it somewhere else than living it," said Aaron Broussard, president of New Orleans' Jefferson Parish.

Katrina knocked out electricity to about 1.3 million people, in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida, utility companies said. Restoring power could take weeks, they warned.

On its way to the coast, the storm swept through oil and gas fields in the Gulf of Mexico where 20 percent of the nation's energy is produced.

At least two drilling rigs were knocked adrift in the gulf and another in Mobile Bay, Alabama, broke free of its mooring and slammed into a bridge.

U.S. oil prices on Monday jumped nearly $5 a barrel in opening trade to peak over $70 and on Tuesday was holding above $68 as oil firms assessed damage from the hurricane.

By Tuesday morning, Katrina had moved inland to northeastern Mississippi where the National Hurricane Center in Miami said it was downgraded to a tropical storm with 50 mph (80 kph) winds.