re: Did anybody have family in/around NOLA that were clueless about Katrina coming?

I had a death in the family and the funeral was the Friday before Katrina.. I had looked at the forecast map on Tuesday and had it going back into the west coast of Florida.. I didn't look at it again for the week... I got a call on Saturday from my boss saying that they needed me to come in for the hurricane.. I heard from some friends that it was "headed" in the direction of NO but no mention of the strength.. I had never left for a storm and was considering on staying in my little house in Gentilly.. Later I thought I am glad work called me in...

Cell phones were not as wide spread as they are today... I had one but didn't have a text plan.. Work decided to evacuate Tuesday morning and we arrived in BR sometime in the afternoon.. No place to stay or eat or take a shite... My sister lives in BR and I tried calling her multiple times and there was no answer. Texting was free after that and I got a text from someone that said they had evacuated to Florida and for whatever reason I thought it was my sister and I had a little freak out... Turns out it was a friend I didn't the contact listed in my phone.. I finally got in touch with my sister and stayed with her.. When I walked in she said I smelled like a skunk and to get in the shower.. They/we were without power for about 4 days?

quote:

---

They packed a few days of clothes ... thinking they'd be back to NOLA after a few days.

---

Guilty...between hurricane George and Katrina I had evacuated 4/5 times and was used to the near misses and coming home a couple days later. The week of Katrina I had been on a work trip and did NOT feel like leaving. On the Saturday prior to the storm I brought my daughter to cross country practice on the lakefront and saw all the people in gas lines on Robert E Lee. That's when I turned on WWL and realized we'd better evacuate to Pineville again.

We left at 2 AM Sunday with 4 days of clothes, insurance policies and my laptop. shite happened fast and by Wednesday or Thursday I had an apartment in Kingwood Texas and kids enrolled in public schools there. We made it back to the house in late September: had $25K of wind damage and $130K in flood damage. My goal was to renovate the house before Dominican and Brother Martin reopened in January, and I made it happen with cash to spare.

Me.....I had just spent a week in Vegas and flew back into MSY late Saturday night. Instead of heading home, I went straight to Baton Rouge for a party. The next morning, around 7 a.m., my phone rang, it was my parents. They told me they were evacuating New Orleans and would swing by to pick me up on their way to Houston. I was half-asleep thinking, What are they even talking about? But sure enough, they showed up, and we hit the road. What should’ve been a 3–4 hour drive from Baton Rouge turned into a grueling 12-hour trek in contraflow traffic all the way to Houston.

A few days later, I flew back from Houston into Baton Rouge. I had a FEMA pass that let me get on I-10 into New Orleans as a first responder. I’ll never forget the moment I hit Kenner, coming off that long stretch of I-10 from LaPlace. The U-Haul storage facility’s wall had collapsed, you could see straight into each unit, people’s lives laid out like open boxes. And even before reaching the city, you could smell it; decay, mold, death, carried on the air.

When I got to Clearview and I-10, the road was blocked. I had to get off and take Veterans. It was eerie, not just the debris scattered everywhere, but the sight of National Guard humvees rolling by, soldiers manning turrets, and Black Hawks overhead, dropping people onto the interstate to be evacuated. Also bc of marshall law being invoked, you had to be out of the city by sundown or in your house bc the national guard would arrest you or possibly shoot your arse.

What really burned into my memory was driving toward Lake Ave and seeing West End, completely underwater from the breach at the 17th Street Canal. I remember look at it and thinking this is what it must feel like when the world ends and society collapses.

For the next semester, I bounced between Baton Rouge, New Orleans, and Houston, acting as a liaison for my family while they stayed in the Galleria area. My siblings went to Strake Jesuit and St. Ann’s. There were so many New Orleans kids at Strake that they had to split schedules, with all the NOLA kids going to class from 3 p.m. to 9 p.m. My brother told me that many of the evening teachers were actually from New Orleans themselves, which made it surreal: same teachers, same classmates, just in a completely different city.

That’s what I remember; it was chaotic, surreal, and unforgettable.

Terrebonne was pretty far outside the path of the hurricane. So just rain and electricity makes sense.

The documentary made it seem like the very late mandatory evacuation in Nola was simply to cover themselves but not really practical. So many of the population without cars.

Even that one guy that decided to leave with apparently enough time got stuck on the road in the worst possible time.

Lots of blame to go around but the engineers who designed the levee system in the 1960s or whenever and everyone knowing for decades it was seriously flawed seems to be the area deserving most blame.

I was an out of state student who had just started LSU a week before. We lost power and cell service on campus the next day, so when they cancelled school for a week, I decided to drive home and surprise my parents, not knowing what had happened.

I12 was completely fine, but when I made it into Mississippi on 59, it was a disaster. I tried to turn around when the interstate became impassible, but 59 south was closed too. I drove through the woods and down back roads, had to go to random strangers houses for gas, etc. It took me about 12 hours to navigate from Pearl River to Laurel - where I slept in my car waiting on gas. It was a crazy 2 days. My parents thought I was missing the whole time.

The destruction from the wind and tornados in that area, was like nothing I had ever imagined.

quote:

---

marshall law

---

What's Katrina?

quote:

---

Little did I know then that that probably was the source of all my future troubles with women haha.

---

Women have been the source of all my trouble with women.