Читать книгу Katrina: A Freight Train Screamin’ - Cary Black - Страница 22
ОглавлениеCapt. Joe Fincher had been with the New Orleans Fire Department for 24 years when Hurricane Katrina visited the Gulf Coast.
Joe is a tall man a quiet voice and a ready smile. He is soft spoken and humble in his approach. His comments are interspersed with smiles and calm laughter. When speaking about the New Orleans Fire Department, the twinkle in his eyes and the pride in his heart are obvious.
When asked what has kept him on as a firefighter in New Orleans, he laughed and said, “I guess I have really just enjoyed it. You often hear politicians say that being in Public Service is gratifying, well in the Fire Department, that’s very true; you really get the opportunity to serve people. I think it’s one of the highest callings a person can have to serve people, and I have really enjoyed my career and have found it very fulfilling.”
He added, “…we in the Fire Department also like to say, regarding the difference between the Fire Department and the Police Department, is that everyone is happy to see the Fire Department when we arrive. Only 50% of the people are happy to see the police arrive.”
During the week before Katrina, it was business as usual. Joe said that the week before Katrina struck, reports indicated she was an insignificant tropical storm. He said, “All of the weather reports led us to believe that the storm was really no concern to us, as it wasn’t supposed to head our way.”
Joe recalled being at a prayer service at his church on the previous Tuesday. The Pastor broke out in an inspiring rendering of the 23rd Psalm. Joe felt trepidation during the utterance of ‘walking through the shadow of death’. He said, “This kind of thing doesn’t happen very often and I remember feeling very concerned; at the time I didn’t know why.” He remembered that a premonition that something bad was going to happen stuck with him over the next week. While speaking of this feeling of doom, he closed his eyes a moment, shook his head as if to shake off a memory of something unnerving or uncomfortable. His premonition that something bad was going to happen hung heavy with him in the week before Katrina. As the week drew to an end and the news of Katrina became increasingly alarming, Joe knew that she was the basis for his concern.
On August 25th, the following Thursday, Katrina was upgraded to a Category 1 storm and rode across the southern tip of Florida, losing much of her energy. By 10:30 pm on Friday, August 26th, she re-entered the Gulf Coast and regained some of her former strength. She once again became a Category 1 storm. Fed by the warm waters of the Gulf, she achieved Category 2 status 30 minutes later.
At 4:00 a.m. on Saturday, August 27th, she was upgraded to Category 3. By 10:00 a.m., predictions of a landfall somewhere between Morgan City, Louisiana and the mouth of the Pearl River (including New Orleans) were being communicated.
Throughout Saturday, August 27th, the Hurricane Liaison Coordination teams met with FEMA Headquarters, staff in Florida, Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi, and Georgia. Briefings occurred between the Max Mayfield, the Director of NOAA’s Tropical Predication Center/National Hurricane Center and Kathleen Blanco, Governor of Louisiana, Bill Filter, Chief of Operations, Alabama Emergency Management Agency, Haley Barbour, Governor of Mississippi, and Ray Nagin, Mayor of New Orleans.
At 10:00 p.m. on Saturday, August 27th, a Hurricane Warning was issued for the area. Media alerts were implemented through the region. At 12:04 a.m., Sunday, August 28th, 2005, Katrina was elevated to a Category 4 status with 145 miles per hour winds. At 6:15 a.m., Sunday, August 28th, Katrina was elevated to a Category 5 Hurricane.
Joe recalled that, “I don’t think it was until Saturday morning that it was actually confirmed that it was coming towards us, though as early as Thursday or Friday, I knew it was coming. I knew right then that that’s what my premonition of something bad was all about.”
By Sunday, August 28th, people were deciding if they were going to stay in town or evacuate. Through Saturday and Sunday, the Fire and Police Departments were making hurried decisions as to the best way to deal with what looked like a direct hit scenario. During this time, Katrina exhibited wind speeds of over 165 miles per hour.
As Katrina approached, Joe was on duty with the crew of Engine 18 of the 5th District. They were stationed at Lake Marina Tower, a pre-established ‘last resort’ location. The crew consisted of 3 Captains, Operators and 4 firefighters.
The hurricane protocol for the Fire Department during a hurricane is to get their resources out of the Fire Stations and in to staging areas commonly referred to as “areas of last resort.” These areas were typically larger buildings with multiple stories. These locations required buildings with solid core stairways and sufficient storage room for assets such as trucks and other gear.
Multiple areas of last resort were implemented throughout the city. Joe remembered being concerned about his area’s location as he had worries about the building’s ability to withstand 165 miles per hour winds. He recalled, “I called the Deputy’s Office because I was so concerned about my guys. I asked if we could move to the Fairgrounds. Engine 21's crew was at the Fairgrounds…well, I remember them having refrigerators and such so that’s why I asked about moving us there, rather than being right on the lake.”
Joe got word from Deputy Chief Gary Fank who said, "We've got you there for a reason."
“I thought to myself that this is the reason, this was meant to be.” Thus, Joe’s crew remained on Lake Pontchartrain at Lake Marina Tower throughout the storm and the aftermath. Joe’s location was about 2 blocks from the 17th St. Canal. The canal extended into the city from the lake, and from their location, they had a view of the canal and could easily observe the water levels within the canal. Joe recalled that when the storm arrived, they were watching the levee, but with the extreme wind and rain, the visibility was poor.
Earlier in the day, Sunday, Engine 18 had had several calls requiring response. They moved to their staging areas Sunday evening. Joe noted during their earlier calls how many people were still in town at this time.
As Sunday night wore on, the sounds of the wind and rain increased. The crews were watching news reports, and then tried to get some rest in preparation for the unknown, certain that calamity awaited them.
Joe indicated that when wind speeds get between 40 and 50 miles per hour, responding to a call is considered unsafe. “I remember that even though they weren’t supposed to go out, crews on the other side of our district went back into service and responded to a 2-alarm fire in the area. I remember that incident because it was above and beyond the call of duty; they weren’t mandated to go, but they went and fought that fire, which was occurring as hurricane force winds were hitting city.” Through the night the sounds of the rain pounding and wind moaning and screeching dominated their senses. Joe laughed that he even got a bit of sleep.
At about 8:00 a.m., some large plate glass windows (rated for wind speeds of 150 miles per hour) failed and blew into the building causing windows in the back to blow out. He recalls the wind was still strong, but in watching the levee and surveying the view, there was a general feeling that the city had “dodged a bullet.”
From their vantage, they could see there was still 3 to 4 feet until the water reached the top of the levee. The floodwalls had gates that were closed, and they could see how high the water was because it was squirting from both sides of the closed gates. They could see the level of the water and see it squirting out from the sides of the levee.
Joe recalled having people calling him asking how the levee was looking. “It was about 8:30, maybe 9:00 in the morning, and I was saying that it looked like ‘we skated’.”
It was shortly after 9:00 a.m. when they began noticing that the water was starting to rise in the parking lot behind the building. They reported the rising water to the District Chief. The Superintendent was monitoring the radio and he asked them to keep him informed of the rate of rise. Joe remembered Captain Paul Hellmers (also of Engine 18) in particular saying that he thought there might have been a break in the levee appearing to come from the 17th Street Canal. Joe and others members of Engine 18 were speculating that perhaps the winds were so intense that they were blowing the water over the top of the levee.
Joe credits Capt. Hellmers for being the first to come to the realization that the levee had failed. At 9:23 a.m., Hellmers reported the water was rising rapidly and was 4 feet from the top of the inside of the levee. In the Lake Marina Tower parking lot, the water had risen 18” in 15 minutes. Later it appeared to be rising about 6” every 15 minutes.
At 9:44 a.m., Firefighter Lee Beba reported that from the rate of water rise, it appeared that the levee had failed, but he didn’t know where. Joe recalled Capt. Hellmers commenting that that he thought the levee may have broken to the west of Lake Marina Tower as the water seemed to be flowing from that direction. It turned out he was correct. At 9:50 a.m., Capt Hellmers reported a water rise in the neighborhood of 2 to 4 feet. At 10:08 a.m., he reported the water had risen up to the rooftops.
About 10:30 a.m., after the eye of storm had passed over, Firefighter Gabe King and Joe went up to the 14th floor to get a better view. Gabe pointed in the direction of the 17th St. Canal and said to Joe, “Captain, it looks like the levee is broke over there.” At this time, the wind was still swirling with gusts up to 80 miles per hour, and the rain was coming in at a 90-degree angle.
Joe confirmed Gabe’s observation and immediately called it in, stating that there was a possible 4 to 10 foot break in the levee. After retrieving the binoculars Gabe, Joe and Capt. Hellmers, who was recording the levee with a video camera, confirmed the breach.
The men moved to the 18th floor for a better view. Here they had a better vantage point and saw another breach of 20 feet not visible from the 14th floor vantage point. They could see that the floodwall had collapsed along a 200 feet section on top of the levee between the breaks, but the levee remained intact beneath and little water flowed over the levee as the level of the water in the canal was roughly equal with the top of the levee. The water was flowing out like a river through the 2 breaches.
When Joe radioed in the message, he was able to say, “Break in the levee, confirmed by 3 people with binoculars.” He knew there were many people listening on the other end, and he didn’t want there to be any confusion or miscommunication whatsoever.
After the breach was reported, Joe recalled that Chief Charles Parent, the Superintendent of the New Orleans Fire Department, called them on the radio to get the details of the break in the levee. Joe and Capt. Hellmers described to him in detail what he and his crew were observing.
Joe was ordered to monitor the levee and to report back every 15 minutes. At that time, the levee break was about 10 feet long in one area and about 20 foot long in another. Joe recalled that 2nd District Chief Chris Mickal, whose house, like Joe’s, was near the 17th Street Canal said, “He'd remember my report for the rest of his life.”
As the Lakeview neighborhood around the 17th Street Canal was home to many of the firefighters in the department, Joe recalled getting many calls from firefighters radioing in to get updates as to the state of the flooding. All the houses were flooded. Having all those firefighters radioing in and asking the status of the neighborhoods and having to relay that all the houses were flooded brought morale down. At this point, the magnitude of what they were observing began to settle in their hearts and souls.
The implications of the levee breaking for the people and City of New Orleans were significant. A feeling of foreboding and uncertainty quieted the crew as their realizations of the severity of what they were seeing began to dominate their thoughts. Capt. Hellmers recalled that upon seeing the levee breaches, they knew that the city’s fate was sealed and that many lives would be lost. He recalled a horrible helpless feeling knowing that people were drowning nearby and they couldn’t help anyone until conditions improved. Joe indicated, however, that if they knew where the people were they would have tried to save as many as possible. He began to think back to all the people he had seen in the city during his calls on Sunday. It went through his mind just how many people were out there, which meant of course, there could be a lot of people dying as the water was rising.
He always thought about such things, as any Firefighter does, when a call goes out indicating that ‘people are trapped at a certain address’. He would always stop and say a prayer that those people would get out, or that the firefighters on the scene would pull them out to safer areas. In considering such circumstances, it was relevant to one house and one call. Now the sentiment coupled with fear and dread extended to a whole city. It was Joe’s fear that what he was seeing was going to be worse than the 9-11 disaster.
They learned later that it was not just this area affected. Levees had failed throughout the city. 80% of the city of New Orleans was under from 4 to 25 feet of water. Joe later learned that in his home water had risen between the first and second floor, a depth of about 8.5 feet. Of course, there were variations in elevation throughout the city, which meant some areas were spared from the really deep waters.
The main thing to the crew of Engine 18 at this time was that they knew there had to be a lot of people trapped; they knew that the very instant they were able to do so, they would be going out to help as many people as they possibly could.
In the early afternoon on the previous Saturday, Joe’s wife, Shana and their children left the city. Around noon on Sunday, Joe finally convinced his mother to leave the city as well. His mother met Shana and the kids at Shana’s parents’ home in Tylertown, Mississippi, about a two-hour drive north of New Orleans. Knowing they were safe was obviously a huge relief for Joe. He could focus on the task at hand and not worry so much about the safety of his family.
Immediately after seeing the breaches, Capt. Hellmers and Firefighter King (both tri-athletes) began searching the area from their vantage point on the 18th floor for nearby boats that they could use for retrieval. The closest boats seen were about a block away in the front yard of a home on West Robert E. Lee. There were aluminum flat boats, a wide 16-foot boat and a 14-foot boat. The 16-foot boat was the one they hoped to retrieve. Firefighter King was anxious to go for the boats, but Capt. Hellmers and Joe agreed that they needed to wait for the winds to subside to have a better chance of success and less chance of serious injury.
At about 1:00 p.m., Firefighter King and Capt. Hellmers swam out to retrieve the boat. The current was extremely strong, with west winds gusting to about 50 miles per hour, close to the 17th Street Canal breach and the rushing water.
When they reached the boats, the 16-foot boat had sunk and the 14-foot was about to sink. It was floating in about 7 feet of water with the trailer still strapped to it and about a foot of water in it. King cut the straps with his pocket- knife. They then balanced atop an adjacent chain-link fence and bailed out the boat with buckets they found floating nearby.
After a hard swim, the pair managed to get the boat back to the Tower. Capt. Hellmers was injured twice by submerged debris while retrieving the boat, sustaining large, deep lacerations to the front and back of his left leg.
As soon as Hellmers and King got the boat to the back of the building, Capt. Gordon Case (a skilled boat mechanic) was waiting to get the boat running. Within minutes, Case had the motor started. He and Firefighter Patrick Ball left with the boat to get more boats. The firefighters hoped to have a small fleet of boats operational as quickly as possible.
Operator Steve Condon and Firefighter King swam out and retrieved another boat, which they used most of the day to rescue people. Later in the day that boat’s engine began to sputter and die on them. They managed to find a one-man jet ski next to a house in the neighborhood. They transferred the gas and oil that were on the boat, as well as more gas they had found in the area. With about 30 gallons of gasoline tied to their jet ski, they headed back toward the Lake Marina Tower.
They were boating over Bellaire Dr., a road that runs parallel to the canal and beyond the breach, and had to boat past one of the 17th Canal breaches where the current was swift. Trees and debris blocked any other route. It was proving difficult to balance two men on a one-person jet ski. As they entered the zone of the swifter currents, the engine on the jet ski started to fail. Unfortunately, there was a large natural gas fire blazing on the river down current from the breach. Condon mentioned to King he didn’t think they were going to make it, as the current was rapidly pushing them towards the area where the fire was. They were towing about 30 gallons of gasoline. The firefighters frantically worked on restarting the jet ski. It seemed to have flooded. The jet ski’s engine finally engaged with seconds to spare and the men narrowly avoided the fire and headed back to Lake Marina Tower.
Capt. Case and Firefighter Ball went to get another boat, but when they crossed Old Hammond Highway, they heard people screaming for help. It was a family on a roof (a man, a woman, and children). When they got close to the family, one of them said, “There’s a man screaming for help in the house next door.” Capt. Case steered the boat next to a bathroom window where the screaming could be heard. Firefighter Ball held on to the rain gutter to steady the boat while Capt. Case kicked out the almost submerged window. When they looked in, only the man’s face was visible above the water as the man stood on his toes on the edge of the bathtub struggling to stay alive as the water was rising rapidly. They worked together to pull the man through the tiny window.
Out of the 9 firefighters present, 4 were proficient at operating boats. As the day wore on, they managed to retrieve several other boats and were able to get them started by hot-wiring the ignitions. They immediately began going out into the neighborhood in search of flood victims. Many people were rescued from rooftops, attics, and trees. They were first bringing the people they rescued back to their base of operations (Lake Marina Tower), but they were quickly overwhelmed and had to start bringing people to the bridge over the 17th Street Canal at Old Hammond Highway. While at the bridge later in the evening, Capt. Case and Firefighter Ball met some officials from the Army Corps of Engineers. The men had no boat and insisted that it was urgent that they get to the breach to measure the water depth so that emergency repairs could be planned. Case and Ball brought the men to the breach, where the current was treacherous. The water depth where the levee had been was 25 feet.
From 2:00 p.m. until totally dark, they were driving around in the boats pulling people off roofs and out of second floor windows. The rescue operations continued until it was too dark to see anymore. The men recalled that maneuvering the boats was very difficult with wires and debris above and below the water. Propellers were frequently damaged by submerged vehicles, street signs, branches and fences. They continued to try to acquire extra boats at every opportunity.
The process began again all over at first light Tuesday morning. At this time they had a couple of boats to use. Joe said that it would have been nice if they had had more boats to work with. The couple of crews out the very first day did a really good job. The next morning, they pulled as many people out as they could and continued to canvass the entire area. All over the city, firefighters from all different locations were doing the same thing.
Their radio communications became incremental at best. They received numerous addresses by radio where people were possibly trapped. Every location was investigated and checked off the list. They set up an operation where some men were dispatched to the boats; others would do the cooking while others would gather needed medical supplies, gasoline, oil, etc. It was a well-orchestrated effort. They worked as a team with each member doing his duty to benefit the whole. Joe later found out that these efforts were duplicated throughout the city, independent of any central coordination.
At first, people who were rescued were brought back to the Lake Marina Tower and provided food and water. It became clear pretty quickly, however, that the Tower would not be able to sustain the sheer numbers of people needing rescue. So as not to compromise their last resort area, Chief Joey Lampard requested that “Fire Alarm,” a term used to designate the fire dispatch folks, call the resources in Jefferson Parish and request some vehicles to pick up the evacuated people who were being dropped at the Old Hammond Highway Bridge that crossed the 17th St. Canal immediately next to Lake Pontchartrain. The objective at that point was to get people to dry land where they would be out of danger from the high water. It took about 2 days to get most of the people out of the neighborhoods in which they were working. After the first 2 days, civilians were helping out in the rescue efforts as well.
Dr. Ivor Van Heerden, an LSU researcher who had contributed to the Hurricane Pam scenario noted in his book The Storm stated, “Indeed it is clear that local first responders achieved remarkable success following Katrina…If it was not for these thousands of heroes, the number of fatalities could have been 10,000.” Van Heerden’s calculations were part of the Hurricane Pam scenario and had estimated that 10,000 casualties could be expected for a Hurricane of Pam’s proposed intensity. Pam and Katrina were similar in magnitude.
Joe concurred with Van Heerden’s later assessment that the efforts of the firefighters and the civilian rescuers significantly reduced the predicted death toll derived from the Hurricane Pam scenario. At the time of this writing, the confirmed death toll of Katrina (total of direct and indirect deaths) is over 1,900. However, over 100 people remain categorized as missing in Louisiana. Though a large number, it was significantly lower than the 10,000 deaths predicted by the Hurricane Pam scenario.
For most of Tuesday, they were unable to communicate with dispatch but they could hear intermittent transmissions. Joe recalled that Tuesday evening they had heard from dispatch that there were firefighters and fire alarm (dispatch) personnel trapped at Delgado Community College requesting evacuation. The crew of Engine 18 knew that it wasn’t far from where they were. They made plans to get some boats over to Delgado the first thing in the morning. They found out later that things weren't as dire there as the radio transmission had suggested on Tuesday night. They headed out to Delgado first thing Wednesday morning where they found many NOFD personnel and over 100 civilians who either were rescued or were being looked after by the NOFD at that location.
The men of Engine 18 recalled expecting a huge federal rescue force to arrive and help, but by Tuesday evening, they were surprised when none had. There were some sporadic rescues in the area performed by the Coast Guard by helicopter and by boat, but what they observed fell short of the level for which they hoped.
By Wednesday when no significant government help had arrived, they all accepted that they would work for as long as it took to rescue everyone until they finished the job. It was later learned that much of the Coast Guard’s local resources had been deployed to St. Bernard Parish where the destruction was more severe.
Joe recalled that the efforts of the crews from Engine 35 immediately after Katrina’s passing were nothing short of amazing. Joe’s team was closest to the lake. The firefighters from Engine 35 came into the Lakeview area from City Park at Filmore Avenue rescuing people after 3:00 p.m. Also arriving to help out in the Lakeview neighborhood searches were Capt. Richard Smith and Operator Joe Francis of Engine 13’s crew.
When Capt. Jamie Lampard of E-35 arrived at Filmore Avenue at the Orleans Canal, he said there were people calling for help as far as he could see. E-35’s crew had no boats when they arrived at that location. They had to find boats in the neighborhood. On Monday evening, they brought about 90 people back to the levee at the Orleans Canal where the water on the City Park side had not started to rise yet. They called for RTA buses to bring the people out, but the buses never came. “All our crews stayed out until it was too dark to see.”
Joe was grateful for Engine 35’s activities in their area because it was highly populated and between the crews, they were able to get a lot of people out of harm’s way. Joe recalled the great work of Engine 35’s crew with men such as Capt. Al Schmolke, Capt. Jamie Lampard, Operator Scott Schmitt and Firefighter Charlie Howley.
Folks from Engine 1 and other uptown stations heard Joe and Capt. Hellmers on the radio on the day of the storm had also come to their area to assist. Some of these firefighters included Capt. Jerry Wiltz, Capt. Dave Hebert and Operator Chuck Dalferes. At the crack of dawn on Wednesday, they got into their boats and headed over to Delgado.
While on their way, Case and Hellmers came across a large group of civilian boaters. They stopped the civilians and asked them what they were doing. The civilian boaters were eager to help. Some were enlisted to go to Delgado. Others were sent with a Firefighter guide to an apartment complex at Robert E. Lee and Paris Avenue, where it was reported that there was a large group of elderly people. The rest were given assignments to search streets and areas that had not been searched yet.
On the way to Delgado, they arrived at the railroad underpass where there were train tracks crossing Canal Blvd. The water had risen as far as the tracks, and the tracks were dry. With all of the manpower available, they immediately began dragging boats over the railroad tracks. Capt. Richard Smith of E-13 led a group of about 10 civilian boats to Delgado. At this time, because of all the civilians helping out with the rescues, they decided to make the dry tracks a staging area.
Firefighter Charlie Howley arrived on one of the boats from Delgado. Joe had worked closely with Charlie when they were assigned to Engine 4. Firefighter Howley joined the operation and coordinated some of the Cajun Navy to evacuate the remaining people at Delgado. He additionally coordinated the transfer of several boatloads of civilians from the St. Bernard Housing complex and from the Orleans Avenue Pumping station to the FEMA staging area on I-10 near the 17th Street Canal. He then joined Joe’s crew for the remainder of the day at the staging area atop the train tracks. There were still areas that need to be searched on both sides of the tracks, so they enlisted the aid of the civilians to complete the searches.
The dry tracks area became the staging area for transferring boats from one side to the other. Joe, Firefighter Lee Beba, and Operator Stanley Harris occupied the tracks and spent their time lifting boats over to the other side. Many civilian volunteers were drafted to help the firefighters at the tracks as well.
Since they had searched on the lake side of the tracks, they enlisted civilians to search the other side. Joe recalled that Capt. Case and Capt. Hellmers were in a boat and went back through the neighborhoods to find as many boats as possible, as they knew there would be lot of people coming over.
Joe sent Firefighter King to the other side of the train tracks, along with a large number of civilians. Before long, Joe could see a lot of the Fire Department people coming up in boats.
He said, “It was a beautiful sight! I looked behind me and saw what looked like hundreds of boats.” The armada was being referred to as the ‘The Cajun Navy,’ a name that Douglas Brinkley popularized in his bestselling book about the storm The Great Deluge.
The Cajun Navy represented hundreds of boats and volunteers coming from all over southern Louisiana. The entity was born on Tuesday, August 30, when State Senator Nick Gautreaux initiated a public request during the 5:00 news on Lafayette’s KATC and KLFY television stations. Gautreaux’s request was for every able-bodied citizen with a boat to show up at the Acadiana Mall on Johnston Street in Lafayette, Louisiana by 5 a.m., Wednesday morning and drive to New Orleans to help rescue stranded flood victims. When Gautreaux arrived at the Acadiana Mall in the early hours of Wednesday morning, the Mall parking lot was filled with boats and trucks of all shapes and sizes, with hundreds of people willing to help rescue their fellow Louisiana citizens.
Later on Wednesday, many of the civilian armada had been stuck on the other side of the overpass trying to get through the FEMA paperwork. They had to sign all kinds of papers following the FEMA bureaucracy and were frustrated because they wanted to get out and start helping people. They said they were held up for several hours and were thrilled to death to finally get out of there and begin assisting in the operations. They set up an area where people were deployed on both sides of the train tracks to assist in moving the boats back and forth across the tracks.
The communication generators had flooded on Monday, thus communications were a problem. At the dispatch center, the water had risen so high that all the generators were dead, and transmissions were not possible.
The only accessible communications was Channel F on their radios. It was being used by all the first responders. Channel F worked as a type of walkie-talkie and had weaker signal strength than their regular channels. It was generally used as a redundant fall-back channel in the event that the communication towers were lost or Dispatch went down. Joe recalled that they would sporadically pick up transmissions from across the city but typically, the range was limited to a mile or two. Joe was not able to communicate with the men at Lindy Boggs, which is about one-and-a-half miles from the tracks.
At this time, parts of the city were experiencing flood depths of up to 20 feet. There were 11hospitals in New Orleans. Most were flooded and without electricity. Conditions were chaotic.
Capt. Mike Donaldson was on one of the boats coming from Delgado. He had just arrived at Delgado after walking from Lindy Boggs and he saw the conditions there. He notified the firefighters at the staging area that 15 people were immediately in danger of losing their lives and that a rescue operation needed to be organized.
“Firefighter Gabe King had been sent to Lindy Boggs when we first arrived at the train tracks just after dawn, and civilian crews were sent in with Capt. Mike Donaldson and Firefighter Reginald Kelly.” Captain Gerry Aitken and Firefighter Barret Williams were at Lindy Boggs, as it was their staging area for Engine 26 during the storm. Captain Aitken had scouted out an area about a block away from the hospital next to the U.S. Post Office, on Jefferson Davis Parkway, for helicopter evacuations to begin. There was a high patch of dry ground that was used as a landing zone right next to Bayou St. John. The hospital was about a mile-and-a-half from the staging area on the tracks. The crew on the tracks recalled that they had heard later that Firefighter Capt. Aitken had a crew on the site of the hospital and that the scene was horrific.
Lindy Boggs was caring for 120 patients when Katrina struck. Many of the patients’ and employees’ families also sought refuge at the hospital. When the levees failed and the water rose, the occupants found themselves stranded at the facility. Many of the critical patients were recovering from organ transplants and as such were at great risk because with no power, cardiac monitoring and mechanical ventilation systems were non-functional. The firefighters and hospital staff were desperately trying to keep critically ill patients alive by squeezing ventilator bags and conducting CPR for long periods of time. “They were rendering first aid and doing all of this with inoperable equipment…it was a mess.”
Lindy Boggs Emergency plan required that the sickest people were to be evacuated first. The hospital staff prepared for patient evacuation by labeling patients with an A, a B, or a C: “A” meant they could walk out on their own; “B” meant they had medical problems that needed attention; and “C” was critical condition. At first the letter designations were written on tags. When the tags ran out, the letter designations were written on foreheads or other body parts.
Firefighters from Shreveport, Louisiana, arrived early Wednesday morning to assist the hospital staff. The New Orleans firefighters from Engine 26 were already on the scene, as Lindy Boggs was one of the 18 ‘Areas of Last Resort’ established by the department prior to the storm. The Shreveport firefighters imposed new rules for evacuation in which the healthiest patients were to leave first and the most critical to go last. Such an emergency triage system was difficult for the doctors on site and hospital staff having to determine who could leave and who couldn’t with the decision potentially leading to the death of a critical patient. Katrina was a large scale mass emergency situation requiring mass casualty incident (MCI) triage protocol.
The rationale for the emergency triage approach allows for the rescue of as many people as possible as quickly as possible. After the majority of the patients leave, rescuers can then concentrate on the more critical ones, who take longer to move.
The NOFD firefighters worked independently of the Shreveport guys. There was enough work to go around.
Capt. Aitken recalled not agreeing with the imposed triage system. The NOFD men literally carried patients all day long to the boats and from the boats to the helicopters. Firefighter Gabe King said that patients from Lindy Boggs were loaded first onto the helicopters followed by people from the neighborhood who were trying to evacuate as well. Neighborhood people perfectly understood and agreed that sick people should be evacuated first. Their approach was contrary to MCI protocol.
The staging area atop the train tracks was about 1½ miles from Lindy Boggs, whereas the post office was right next door to Lindy Boggs. The Cajun Navy was immensely helpful in moving the patients in the boats. They had very sick people, including people on spine boards brought to the staging area at the train tracks via boat.
On Wednesday, August 30th, 2005, boatload after boatload of people arrived at the staging area. 2 helicopters were waiting sitting face to face near an area of dry land by the post office near Lindy Boggs. They were taking people back and forth all day. The Cajun Navy moved the folks and brought in boats from the staging area to another at the I-10/I-610 overpass. Other people were airlifted out by the helicopters, which could hold up to 15 people per trip.
Patients from the hospital were evacuated (several hundred during the course of the day) via boat to the staging area on the train tracks. Hundreds of people were evacuated by helicopter at the landing zone set up next to the post office. The transporting and evacuation of people went on all day.
Joe recalled the firefighters and civilians in boats would retrieve the people from the hospital in teams, bring them to the tracks, and transfer them to boats, which would take them to dry areas. Many of the people were transported to the Louis B Armstrong Airport, which became a staging area for people being rescued from the floodwaters.
Members of the Cajun Navy and other volunteers agreed to meet the firefighters again on Thursday morning to pick up where they had left off after it got too dark to operate safely the night before. By Wednesday evening, August 30th, the firefighters had evacuated about 400 people, including most of the 120 patients from Lindy Boggs, as well as hundreds of others from the neighborhoods who were stranded or who needed help to get out.
Joe’s team returned to the staging area Thursday morning to continue evacuating the remaining people from Lindy Boggs as well as other people in the neighborhood still stranded in the upper levels or on the roofs of their homes. Joe recalled that on Thursday morning, “We threw a couple of boats over and I remember it was quiet, like there was no one there, and I was on these train tracks by myself. I kept thinking how odd this was, as I was waiting for the ‘Cajun Navy’ to show back up again.”
They sent Firefighter Gabe King, Operator Steve Condon and Capt. Mike Donaldson to Lindy Boggs to continue bringing the people out by boat. About mid-morning on Thursday, they got a call from the Chief saying that the operation was shutting down.
Apparently, the operation was no longer considered safe. Helicopters and rescue workers were being shot at in the city. Joe recalled “I remember how much the dynamics changed; the whole mood and everything changed.”
Joe said, “It was a lonely feeling…the operation was shut down because of security concerns. We were told that the 82nd Airborne was coming in to do the remainder of the evacuations. We were ordered out and believed that help from the military was imminent.” They learned that there were riots, looting, and craziness going on in the city. Joe recalled hearing of a young girl who had been on one of the boats who had been raped. “It was pretty disheartening. I mean what a shame!”
Joe and his team had seen everything from heroism, camaraderie, a huge spirit of cooperation between firefighters and the civilian volunteers, with people helping each other as best they could. “Then contrast that with what we heard later and what the rest of the world was seeing, I mean it was riots, and fires, and people stealing stuff…it was disheartening.”
Early afternoon on Thursday, Joe and his crew were transported to a Coast Guard station. From the station, they were bought to the New Orleans Saints Training Facility next to Zephyr Field in Metairie, Louisiana, where they met up with some U.S.A.R. (Urban Search and Rescue) people, some from all over the country. Joe recalled that the U.S.A.R. folks treated him and his crew like royalty. “I mean, it was humbling how well they treated us.” Access to showers and a warm meal were a blessing and highly appreciated by Joe and his crew. They slept on the 50-yard line of the indoor Saints' training facility, along with the U.S.A.R. teams and the National Guard. Joe recalled that astroturf was surprisingly comfortable.
Joe also remembered that upon arrival at the complex there was activity everywhere. He was impressed with what he saw. There was a security checkpoint at the road that led into both facilities. 18-wheelers full of supplies were arriving by the minute. He saw U.S.A.R. teams with their equipment spread out and sectioned off across the parking lots of the Saints' facility. Some of the crews had been out already, some had just arrived and they were anxious for assignments. Communication systems were established including computers, radio systems, satellite dishes, televisions, and fax machines.
On the Saints' practice field, helicopters from different agencies and of all persuasions landed and took off by the dozens. Hundreds of helicopters flew overhead each couple of hours. Several hundred National Guard personnel were there with their own equipment. The Saints' cafeteria was used to cook food to feed all of the personnel and it was great to get a hot meal and a cold water to drink.
What Joe observed was the result of the implementation of the IMS (Incident Management System). The IMT (Incident Management Teams) were having meetings soon after 5:00 a.m., with meetings going on with different crews until at least 10:00 p.m. He marveled at their endurance.
The U.S.A.R. people deployed were from all over the country and not familiar with the New Orleans and the Gulf Coast areas. Joe and some of his crew were split up, with one local firefighter assigned to help each U.S.A.R. team. There were 10 U.S.A.R. Teams and each was assigned to a different part of the city. On Saturday they were deployed, going out day after day, every day, following a previously established search and rescue grid system for the area.
By this time, despite all of the activity, little had been accomplished in the first few critical days after Katrina by the U.S.A.R. teams. They were trying to make up for lost time, but for hundreds of people they were too late. Coast Guard helicopters picked up thousands of people from rooftops. The U.S.A.R. teams would have been a great asset early on to assist removing people from attics. Joe recalled they could have used their help.
They had planned to go out Friday, but their missions were called off because of lack of security. The teams were not allowed to initiate any searches until they had accompanying armed security such as National Guardsman or police officers. Joe indicated it was frustrating not being allowed to go out on Friday because of the danger and lack of security.
With security established, Joe said that he hadn’t heard from the guys out in East New Orleans. This crew held up at the Bell South Building during Katrina. The crew in East New Orleans was Joe’s former crew and he had not heard from them. He urged the incident commanders to get one of the U.S.A.R. teams out to meet up with them, as Joe was certain they had probably covered a good portion of East New Orleans already and would be a great asset for the U.S.A.R. teams deployed to that area.
They had arrived at the Saints' facility with about 20 or so other firefighters from other locations. Originally, a truck was going to come for them, and they were to join the rest of the NOFD across the Mississippi River Bridge the next day.
They began to hear that up to 10 billion dollars of supplies and aid was being sent for hurricane relief. Chief Joey Lampard was in charge of our group. He thought they could best help the NOFD and people still trapped in New Orleans by staying where they were.
U.S.A.R. teams from across the country were there, but they didn’t know the geographic layout of the city. A plan was discussed where one New Orleans Firefighter would go out with each U.S.A.R. team. Chief Lampard communicated his thoughts to NOFD brass, and they saw the wisdom of that idea. 11 of the 20 volunteered to stay and assist the U.S.A.R. teams. The next day, the remaining crews returned to the equally challenging fire duties at the NOFD complex at Woodlawn.
“As I told you, to our distress and the distress of the U.S.A.R. teams, the planned searches were postponed until Saturday because of lack of security.” Joe started assisting with logistics working, with Chief Lampard to try to replenish NOFD equipment lost during Katrina. 22 of 33 engine houses were flooded along with many of their fire apparatuses. On Saturday, security had arrived, consisting of police and sheriffs from assorted agencies.
Joe went with a U.S.A.R. team from Sacramento, California on a mission to check out a missing doctor and a priest who had ridden out the storm in his church in the area of the French Quarter. Thankfully, they were both fine and things weren’t as dire in that area as in other areas of the city. In the French Quarter, people could reach dry land a few blocks away. There were a lot of people in the area, but none were in imminent danger…from the flooding at least.
“We arranged to have water and pallets of MREs airdropped in the yard of the church where the priest was to oversee distribution. They heard that the next day, airdrops were ceasing to that location and all locations…all civilians in the city were to be evacuated. We got word that the entire city was to be evacuated and that leaving food and water would only encourage people to stay.”
Tuesday of the next week, Joe went to Mandeville, Louisiana, in a large truck along with some firefighters to pick up fire equipment from across Lake Pontchartrain. While en route, they were listening to WWL radio in New Orleans. WWL is a 50,000 watt clear channel station that broadcasts to a large section of the Gulf Coast. A lady called the station and was very distraught. The last time she had spoken with her father was by cell phone. He was entering the attic of his house during the storm as his house was filling with water. She mentioned an address in eastern New Orleans in Engine 4’s (Joe’s former fire station) territory.
She pleaded with any police that may be listening to go to the mentioned address to check on her father. She then left her phone number so anyone with information could get in touch with her. Joe recalled, “I immediately called her because I knew that we had a U.S.A.R. team in that area in boats that day. I told her that we’d have it checked out and I’d get back to her.”
Joe called Captain Richard Smith who was working with them at the Saints' complex and was working with the coordination of those crews. “I asked him to send the U.S.A.R. team in that area to the given address. He called me back in less than an hour. The U.S.A.R. team had found the lady’s father dead in the attic.” Joe remembered feeling his heart sink, as he now had to do something he never thought he would ever have to do. He called her and told her how sorry he was to inform her that her father had been found dead in the attic.
To his surprise, it was as if the weight of the world had been lifted off her shoulders. She was very sad but very, very appreciative to know the fate of her father. “I cannot remember being thanked so much for anything in my life. I came to realize the torment of people not knowing the fate of loved ones that were missing. I can only imagine the anguish of the hundreds of people who never found out the fate of missing family members from Katrina.”
It turned out that the crews in East New Orleans had already set up their own grids and had rescued hundreds of people before the U.S.A.R. arrived. Joe indicated that if it weren’t for the crews at the Bell South Building, the casualties in East New Orleans would have been significant.
Joe recalled that when he was at the Saints' training facility, the crew was hearing about a lot of fires going on in the city since they had been coordinating with NOFD Headquarters under the leadership of Chief Joey Lampard who was overseeing the firefighter deployments at the training facility. The facility became the main staging area point for the FEMA logistics operations and volunteer firefighters once they began to arrive on the scene.
Joe remembered he had a concern that about half of the city would be prone to fire. While at Lake Marina Tower, he recalled that there was a yacht club a half a mile from the Tower that was burning after the Hurricane. They were helpless to fight the fire as their truck was sitting in 4 feet of water.
In the training facility, firefighter support teams were arriving from Chicago and New York. There were concerns, as there was no water pressure for operating hydrants and such. Fires were a problem due to natural gas leaks. Miraculously, with aid from volunteer firefighters, water trucks and helicopter drops, the fires that occurred were addressed.
It was a week and 2 days before Joe was able to speak with his wife and family. His wife, Shana, and the kids in Tylertown had no idea where Joe was or what was happening with him. The only information they had was from the media, which was reporting on deaths, riots, looting, gangs roaming the streets shooting at rescuers and other catastrophes. It happened that a firefighter from Engine 35, Operator Scott Schmidt, who had come across the train tracks back when Joe’s crew were transferring boats, later ran into Joe’s younger brother who was a Captain in the Baton Rouge Parish Fire Department. Scott communicated to Joe’s brother that he had seen Joe at the tracks and that he was well. Joe’s brother was able to get a message to Shana that Joe was okay. Shana later related that the news was a great relief.
Many who had family or friends who were involved with the initial rescues suffered weeks of uncertainty as to the status of their loved ones. Meanwhile, the only information was from the news media, which continued to relay the horror of what was happening in the city and the other afflicted areas.
Joe recalled when he finally got back to his house. The water had risen between the first and second floors of his home. When asked about his thoughts and feelings when he first came back to his home, he said, “When I was feeling sorry for myself, this is the way I processed it: If you ever had a car stolen…let’s say it’s worth $10,000.” “Well you spent 3 to 4 months working for that car…depending on what your salary is; Fire Department…maybe 6 months,” he laughs… “Not quite that long, but….that person stole several months of your life.”
He continued, “With Katrina, it was like your whole life was wiped out…Everything you had worked for. On top of that, you had another couple of years of your future in rebuilding what had been taken… that’s lost on top of that…it is gone.”
He said, “My faith and my family are the cornerstones of my being. Why does Jesus tell us that the wise man built his house on the rock? Because there will be storms! I don’t know of a single person in the world that hasn’t been through some type of storm, real or metaphorical. Storms we go through help us to grow closer to God and to develop empathy for others.”
In further reflection, Joe said, “All of my belongings and my family’s belongings after Katrina fit in a few trash bags… but I had my family. During the time when I couldn’t contact my wife and children after Katrina, I started to think how silly some of the disagreements I had with my wife had been. I gained a perspective from Katrina that I am most thankful. I’ve learned not to take for granted the time that we spend with friends and loved ones. I’ll always treasure the time I spent over the years with Ricky McCurley and all I learned from him.”
Except for the weeks after Katrina, Ricky never worked overtime at the fire station, which would have meant working 48 hours straight away from his family. When asked why he didn’t work overtime, Ricky replied, “Because some things are more important than money.” He chose to spend time instead with his wife Kyndel and Kai, his 3 year old son. He chose right!”
Many people had no insurance. Retired and elderly people found their ‘nest eggs’ eradicated. The death rate in New Orleans shot up dramatically after Katrina. Joe felt that many of the deaths could be attributed to the broken hearts of those people who did indeed lose everything.
As part of the relief efforts, FEMA contracted with Carnival Cruise Lines to supply 6 of the cruise ships for 6 months to serve as temporary housing in the aftermath of the Katrina. The “Holiday” was originally docked in Mobile, AL and later at Pascagoula, MS. The ‘Ecstasy’ and ‘Sensation’ were docked in New Orleans. The controversial six-month contract cost $236 million. In New Orleans, the police and their families typically occupied the ‘Ecstasy’, while the Fire Department occupied the ‘Sensation.’
