re: What was Katrina like?

The Sunday morning National Weather Service bulletin warning the region is probably the scariest message they've ever released.. as the hurricane the size of the entire Gulf with 175 mph winds tore towards the coast:

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URGENT — WEATHER MESSAGE
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE NEW ORLEANS LA
1011 AM CDT SUN AUG 28, 2005

...DEVASTATING DAMAGE EXPECTED...

HURRICANE KATRINA...A MOST POWERFUL HURRICANE WITH UNPRECEDENTED
STRENGTH... RIVALING THE INTENSITY OF HURRICANE CAMILLE OF 1969.

MOST OF THE AREA WILL BE UNINHABITABLE FOR WEEKS...PERHAPS LONGER. AT
LEAST ONE HALF OF WELL CONSTRUCTED HOMES WILL HAVE ROOF AND WALL
FAILURE. ALL GABLED ROOFS WILL FAIL...LEAVING THOSE HOMES SEVERELY
DAMAGED OR DESTROYED.

THE MAJORITY OF INDUSTRIAL BUILDINGS WILL BECOME NON FUNCTIONAL.
PARTIAL TO COMPLETE WALL AND ROOF FAILURE IS EXPECTED. ALL WOOD
FRAMED LOW RISING APARTMENT BUILDINGS WILL BE DESTROYED. CONCRETE
BLOCK LOW RISE APARTMENTS WILL SUSTAIN MAJOR DAMAGE...INCLUDING SOME
WALL AND ROOF FAILURE.

HIGH RISE OFFICE AND APARTMENT BUILDINGS WILL SWAY DANGEROUSLY...A
FEW TO THE POINT OF TOTAL COLLAPSE. ALL WINDOWS WILL BLOW OUT.

AIRBORNE DEBRIS WILL BE WIDESPREAD...AND MAY INCLUDE HEAVY ITEMS SUCH
AS HOUSEHOLD APPLIANCES AND EVEN LIGHT VEHICLES. SPORT UTILITY VEHICLES
AND LIGHT TRUCKS WILL BE MOVED. THE BLOWN DEBRIS WILL CREATE
ADDITIONAL DESTRUCTION. PERSONS...PETS...AND LIVESTOCK EXPOSED TO THE
WINDS WILL FACE CERTAIN DEATH IF STRUCK.

POWER OUTAGES WILL LAST FOR WEEKS...AS MOST POWER POLES WILL BE DOWN
AND TRANSFORMERS DESTROYED. WATER SHORTAGES WILL MAKE HUMAN SUFFERING
INCREDIBLE BY MODERN STANDARDS.

THE VAST MAJORITY OF NATIVE TREES WILL BE SNAPPED OR UPROOTED. ONLY
THE HEARTIEST WILL REMAIN STANDING...BUT BE TOTALLY DEFOLIATED. FEW
CROPS WILL REMAIN. LIVESTOCK LEFT EXPOSED TO THE WINDS WILL BE
KILLED.

AN INLAND HURRICANE WIND WARNING IS ISSUED WHEN SUSTAINED WINDS NEAR
HURRICANE FORCE...OR FREQUENT GUSTS AT OR ABOVE HURRICANE FORCE...ARE
CERTAIN WITHIN THE NEXT 12 TO 24 HOURS.

ONCE TROPICAL STORM AND HURRICANE FORCE WINDS ONSET...DO NOT VENTURE
OUTSIDE!

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The Sunday morning National Weather Service bulletin warning the region is probably the scariest message they've ever released.. as the hurricane the size of the entire Gulf with 175 mph winds tore towards the coast:

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I was in NOLA for a party the Friday before Katrina and after seeing the weather reports that night, cancelled the rest of my weekend and got up bright and early and got the hell out Saturday morning. I read that bulletin on Sunday after I got home and knew that barring a majorly unexpected turn from the storm, I'd likely seen NOLA as I'd known it for the last time.

I talked to some guy from California, if I remember correctly, in the atrium lobby of a hotel on Canal Street that Friday night. We'd stopped in for a drink there and the weather report that pushed my "get the frick out" button was on the TV. We were all watching the weather report and that guy was excited to actually get to go through a hurricane. It never occurred to him that those of us who had been through hurricanes were afraid of what was coming and were getting out of the city ASAP. We urged him to leave the next day, but he was hellbent on staying and made some sort of a-hole comment about how he can tread water and he'd be okay and that we were kind of pussies for being afraid. One of my buddies asked him if it mattered to him if the water was up to the ceiling of the atrium, and he said that it could never happen.

I wonder what happened to him.

My baby brother lived in Nola, very close to the Dome, when Katrina hit. We were in Baton Rouge. When my parents and I read that weather bulletin, we called him and begged him to leave. He had no intentions of doing so.

When my dad got on the phone, the night before the storm hit, and told him that if he didn't leave at that moment that he was coming down there to get him...shite got real for him. He packed up and left. He went home to a destroyed, looted apartment. He still thanks my dad for jumping his shite and making him leave.

The NWS warning you posted kinda swung and missed as to storm surge. (It wasn't mentioned)

I realize they wouldn't know that the NOLA levees would fail but any place that sized storm made landfall was going to have major storm surge issues.

bullshite.

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They basically said, if you stay, you die. And everyone who leaves will come back to nothing.

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That's what the news had us believing. Rumors that I heard the few days after the storm hit were that the city in its entirety was pretty much destroyed. As bad as it was the news made it worse.

I just pissed my pants.

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I remember the warning that if you planned to stay to write your name on your arm with a permanent marker so your body would be easier to identify - and also get an axe so you can chop your way out of your attic because you could very likely end up in your attic when the water rose and you would have no way out. That was scary as hell just to hear.

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Most old New Orleans people knew to have the ax in the attic. My family cut its way out during Betsy as did a lot of people.

What did businesses do for payroll? Did people in professional jobs still get paid? I guess hourly workers were SOL? Not that people were worried about that at that point.