| News
Headlines | September 4, 2005 |
| New Orleans Left to the Dead and Dying NEW ORLEANS (AP) - Thousands more bedraggled refugees were bused and airlifted to salvation Saturday, leaving the heart of New Orleans to the dead and dying, the elderly and frail stranded too many days without food, water or medical care. |
U.S. Troops Abroad to Help With Katrina Relief DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — The U.S. Air Force will send 300 airmen home from Iraq and Afghanistan to help their families cope with emergencies on an air base devastated by Hurricane Katrina in Biloxi, Miss., a spokesman said Saturday. |
| Last Refugees Leave the Superdome NEW ORLEANS (AP) - The last 300 refugees in the Superdome climbed aboard buses Saturday bound for new temporary shelter, leaving behind a darkened and stinking arena strewn with trash. |
Texas Nearing Refugee Capacity HOUSTON (AP) - With more than 220,000 hurricane refugees camped out in Texas and more coming, Gov. Rick Perry warned Saturday that his enormous state was running out of room. |
| 'Urban Warfare' Slowed New Orleans Rescue New Orleans Police Chief Edwin Compass said Friday that hurricane rescue efforts were hampered when relief workers came under attack by the city's criminal element, prompting conditions that resembled "urban warfare." |
Hurricane Victims Reunite at Center HOUSTON — In the midst of trying to find her husband and three youngest children, Hurricane Katrina (search) survivor Lisa Stewart temporarily lost her three oldest children in the cavernous Astrodome. |
| Governments Pledge Aid After Katrina (Reuters) -- Hurricane Katrina has devastated New Orleans and U.S. Gulf Coast states, killing hundreds of people and possibly thousands, and drawing support pledges from rich and poor, traditional friends and foes of the United States. |
GOP Wants Giuliani for Katrina Czar Rep. John Sweeney, R-N.Y., urged President Bush to appoint former New York City mayor Rudolph Giuliani or two former military officials to run the ground response in the Gulf Coast, saying local authorities are not up to the task.
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| Help Comes, But Too Late For Many CBS/AP) Thousands more bedraggled refugees were bused and airlifted to salvation Saturday, leaving the heart of New Orleans to the dead and dying, the elderly and frail stranded too many days without food, water or medical care. |
Airlines Begin Voluntary Relief Effort WASHINGTON — Relief flights donated by airlines began to fly into Louis Armstrong International Airport (search) in New Orleans at a rate of about four an hour, beginning midday Friday. |
| Profile of New Orleans, Before Hell Broke Loose Beneath the frantic and putrid abyss of looters and bodies and desperation that New Orleans became last week, there's a decadent city of crawfish bisque and sparkling jazz, a ferocious city that beat back the British army, a tenacious city that has survived plague and fires, a seductive and sultry and sweet place beloved by many. |
Storm Surge the Fatal Blow for New Orleans (CNN) -- Hurricane storm surges have resulted in limited flooding of the city of New Orleans before. But Hurricane Katrina's winds pushed in a devastating surge of water from the Gulf of Mexico that overwhelmed the city's system of levees built to hold back the surrounding Mississippi River and Lake Pontchartrain. |
| Final Chapter in Storm Exodus Is Epic Bus Journey ABOARD BUS NUMBER 1025 (AP) - They wait in the baking sun atop mounds of stinking garbage and walk barefoot through filthy pools of water. And they are smiling. |
Gulf Coast Jobless Rate Could Be 25 Pct. WASHINGTON - The jobless rate in the hurricane-ravaged Gulf Coast is expected to spike to 25 percent or higher, and when the long rebuilding process begins... |
| Catholic Schools Open to Young Victims of Katrina WASHINGTON, D.C., SEPT. 2, 2005 (Zenit.org).- Catholic schools from across the nation are opening their doors to students displaced by Hurricane Katrina. |
Donations Pour in for Katrina Relief Americans are responding to Hurricane Katrina with a massive outpouring of giving, at times overwhelming call centers and computer servers set up by charities to field donations. |
| Fast Facts: Hurricane Katrina Timeline EW ORLEANS — A day-by-day look at Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath: Wednesday, Aug. 24: Tropical Depression 12 strengthens into Tropical Storm Katrina over the Central Bahamas; a hurricane warning is issued for the southeastern Florida coast... |
Mississippians' Suffering Overshadowed JACKSON, Miss. - Mississippi hurricane survivors looked around Saturday and wondered just how long it would take to get food, clean water and shelter. And they were more than angry at the federal government and the national news media. |
| Katrina's Wrath Hits Holiday Drivers Traffic was light on Atlanta highways Saturday and gas stations that were fortunate enough to have fuel were still charging more than $3 a gallon. In West Virginia, 10 percent of stations ran out of at least one grade of gas. And in Colorado, motorists were encouraged to drive less. |
Evacuees Distraught Over Having to Leave Pets Behind ATLANTA (AP) - As Valerie Bennett was evacuated from a New Orleans hospital, rescuers told her there was no room in the boat for her dogs. She pleaded. "I offered him my wedding ring and my mom's wedding ring," the 34-year-old nurse recalled Saturday. |
| News
Headlines | September 3, 2005 |
| Relief Arrives in New Orleans NEW ORLEANS — To cries of "Thank you Jesus!" and catcalls of "What took you so long?," a National Guard convoy packed with food, water and medicine rolled through axle-deep floodwaters Friday into what remained of New Orleans and descended into a maelstrom of fires and floating corpses. |
New Orleans Like 'the Third World' NEW ORLEANS — Above the din, a woman is screaming the Lord's Prayer as if heaven can no longer hear silent pleas. "And lead us not into temptation," she bellows hoarsely to the unhearing throng, "but deliver us from evil ..." |
| Can This Actually Be Happening in America? Image after image of unrelenting sorrow, layered one atop the other like a deck of haunting cards. A baby held aloft, inches above a sea of desperate faces, gasping for air. The dead left where they've fallen, in plain view, robbed of even the simple dignity of a shroud... |
Exhausted Evacuees Pack New Orleans Airport KENNER, Louisiana (CNN) -- Military helicopters Friday continued flying masses of evacuees to the field hospital and staging center established at the Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport. |
| Hunger and Rage NEW ORLEANS - A great city has descended into chaos. In much of New Orleans yesterday, food and water remained in short supply. Medical help was nowhere to be found. And answers were impossible to come by. |
One Dead After Busload of Evacuees Overturns OPELOUSAS, La. (AP) - One Hurricane Katrina evacuee died and many others were injured when a bus carrying them from the Superdome swerved across a highway median and overturned Friday. |
| Shameful: Only 25 Nations Offer Help to the U.S. When the Indian Ocean tsunami devastated many nations across Asia in December, the United States rushed to the aid of victims by pledging hundreds of millions of dollars in assistance – just as it has offered aid whenever a natural disaster strikes in another country. |
Astrodome Fills To Capacity (AP) After accepting more than 11,000 Hurricane Katrina refugees, officials said the Astrodome was full and more than 30 Red Cross shelters are now open as Texas welcomes Hurricane Katrina refugees from Louisiana. Officials in Houston estimated as many as 100,000 people who fled the hurricane were staying in area hotels.
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| Death Toll in Louisiana Could be Above 10,000 BATON ROUGE, United States (AFP) - US Senator David Vitter said that the death toll from Hurricane Katrina could top 10,000 in Louisiana alone. "My guess is that it will start at 10,000, but that is only a guess," Vitter said, adding that he was not basing his remarks on any official death toll or body count. |
Kuwaiti Official: Katrina Sent from Allah In reaction to Hurricane Katrina and the destruction in its wake, a high-ranking Kuwaiti official, Muhammad Yousef Al-Mlaifi, who is director of the Kuwaiti Ministry of Endowment's research center, published an article titled "The Terrorist Katrina is One of the Soldiers of Allah, But Not an Adherent of Al-Qaeda." |
| Networks Set September 9 for Katrina Telethon LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - The six major U.S. television networks agreed on Friday to a September 9 air date for a rare joint broadcast of a live, all-star charity concert to raise money for survivors of Hurricane Katrina. |
Possible Outbreak Worries Military Doctors From dehydration to potential outbreaks of infectious diseases, health care threats along the swamped Gulf Coast concerned military officials on Friday as they beefed up medical evacuations. |
| Mayor Ray Nagin Curses Gov. Blanco, Pres. Bush New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin exploded in frustration last night as his city spun further out of control, saying that Gov. Kathleen Blanco and President Bush need to stop holding "goddman press conferences" and "get their ass[es] on a plane and sit down, the two of them, and figure this out right now." |
Rep. Peter King: Gangs Blocking Relief Efforts Armed gangs of roaming thugs are the primary reason relief efforts in flood-ravaged New Orleans have been delayed, a prominent New York congressman said Friday morning. "The main problem in obstructing the relief operation - it's almost like a Mogadishu-like gang situation that's prevailing in New Orleans," Rep. Peter King told WABC Radio's John Gambling. |
| President Bush Touring Battered Gulf Coast Towns WASHINGTON -- President Bush hopes his tour of Gulf Coast communities battered by Hurricane Katrina will boost the spirits of increasingly desperate storm victims and their tired rescuers. |
Major Developments in Hurricane Katrina's Aftermath Major developments in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina: - A National Guard caravan of at least three-dozen troop vehicles and supply trucks arrived in New Orleans along with dozens of air-conditioned buses to take refugees out of the city... |
| Draining New Orleans Could Take a Month Once beautiful New Orleans could be facing a month or more before all the flood waters from Hurricane Katrina and ruptured levees can be pumped out. |
Major Oil Spill Seen on Mississippi River NEW YORK (Reuters) - Louisiana officials said they spotted a major oil spill from two storage tanks near the town of Venice on the Mississippi River on Friday. |
| Communities Scramble to Cope With Hurricane Refugees Hundreds of thousands of people with no homes, no food, no jobs, no money - the reality is staggering. A mass exodus of refugees from Hurricane Katrina has left communities across the nation scrambling to find ways to care for the newly dispossessed. |
Contact Information for Katrina Relief Aid Groups Emergency management officials recommend that those wishing to assist Hurricane Katrina victims give cash donations and resist going to affected areas. Some charitable organizations recommended by the Federal Emergency Management Agency:... |
| News
Headlines | September 2, 2005 |
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New Orleans Mayor Issues 'Desperate SOS' NEW ORLEANS - Fights and fires broke out, corpses lay out in the open, and rescue helicopters and law enforcement officers were shot at as flooded-out New Orleans descended into anarchy Thursday. "This is a desperate SOS," the mayor said. |
Stories of Heartbreak and Hope in Katrina's Wake Doctors told me that while trying to evacuate critical patients from Charity Hospital in New Orleans, two of the evacuation vehicles came under fire. The doctors said they were able to get all but one of the patients out of the hospital. |
| Bush Tells Displaced: 'A Lot of Help Coming' WASHINGTON (CNN) -- President Bush sought Thursday to reassure victims of Hurricane Katrina that the federal government is doing its best to send aid to the thousands of displaced and stranded people. |
More Navy Ships Headed to the Gulf Coast The aircraft carrier USS Harry S. Truman was heading to the Gulf Coast Thursday to serve as a floating command center for Hurricane Katrina relief operations. |
| Gas Prices, Shortages Prompt Some to Stay Home
Droves of drivers who had looked forward to end-of-summer road trips to the mountains, beach or elsewhere this Labor Day weekend were scrapping their plans in response to soaring gas prices and lengthening lines at the pump. |
Troops to Quadruple New Orleans Police Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said Thursday that 1,400 National Guard troops per day are being sent in to control looting and lawlessness in New Orleans, quadrupling the regular police force in the city by the weekend. |
| Stranded Spain MP Describes Katrina Chaos (CNN) -- A Spanish member of parliament stranded in New Orleans has described a dire situation at the city's Convention Center, including dead bodies inside the building. |
U.S. Border Patrol Moved to Katrina Area U.S. Border Patrol officers are being shifted away from their posts guarding the U.S.-Mexico border to aid in the Katrina Hurricane disaster, leaving the country vulnerable to illegals and terrorists attempting to enter the U.S., NewsMax has learned.
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| Gasoline Surges Again as Rationing Fears Grow Gasoline prices continued to spike higher on Thursday amid mounting fears that demand rationing in the US could prove necessary within weeks if inventories sink further. |
Congress to Vote on $10B Katrina Package WASHINGTON -- The Bush administration intends to seek $10 billion to cover immediate relief needs in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, congressional officials said Thursday, and lawmakers decided to break off their summer vacation to approve the request by the weekend. |
| Teary Gov. Kathleen Blanco 'Overwhelmed' The performance of Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco in the first days after the Katrina disaster has some wondering whether she's up to the daunting task of guiding her state as its largest city struggles to recover. |
Hastert Questions Rebuilding New Orleans It makes no sense to spend billions of dollars to rebuild a city that's seven feet under sea level, House Speaker Dennis Hastert said of federal assistance for hurricane-devastated New Orleans. |
| Katrina's Effects, at a Glance Deaths: The mayor said the hurricane probably killed thousands of people in New Orleans — an estimate that, if accurate, would make the storm the nation's deadliest natural disaster since at least the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. |
Harry Connick Jr.: New Orleans Will Rebuild Harry Connick Jr., who grew up in New Orleans, says the city will rebuild and that its residents are "freakishly strong." In an interview Thursday on NBC's "Today" show, Connick compared the rejuvenating spirit of New Yorkers after the Sept. 11 terror attacks to those in the hurricane-ravaged city. |
| STOPP Condemns PP's Sameles Publicity Stunt WASHINGTON, D.C. - "It is absolutely unconscionable that Planned Parenthood would use the tragedy of hurricane Katrina to push its shameless agenda on the American public," said Jim Sedlak, executive director of American Life League's STOPP International. |
Shortage Looms if Jet-Fuel Disruption Not Fixed Soon Major airports in the East and Southeast could run out of jet fuel as soon as next week if refinery and pipeline shutdowns aren't resolved soon. Shortages appear most severe at airports in Charlotte, Tampa, Orlando and Fort Myers, Fla. |
| Priest Witnesses Devastation WASHINGTON (CNS) -- Divine Word Father Brendan Murphy thought he was just going to celebrate weekend Masses in Lizana, Miss., and then head back to his order's monastery in nearby Bay St. Louis. |
Most Bishops in Hurricane's Path Accounted For WASHINGTON (CNS) -- Efforts by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' Washington headquarters to get through to bishops whose dioceses were in the path of Hurricane Katrina generally met with success in the initial days after the hurricane, as power and telephone outages left bishops and laity alike incommunicado. |
| Clinton-GHW Bush Team Tapped for Katrina Relief President Bush will tour the hurricane devastated Gulf Coast region on Friday and has asked his father, former President George H.W. Bush, and former President Clinton to lead a private fund-raising campaign for victims. |
Catholic Agencies Accept Donations for Hurricane Relief WASHINGTON (CNS) -- Catholic aid agencies are among those accepting donations for the victims of Hurricane Katrina. Among the Catholic organizations receiving donations are... |
| News
Headlines | September 1, 2005 |
| Katrina May Have Killed Thousands NEW ORLEANS -- Hurricane Katrina probably killed thousands of people in New Orleans, the mayor said Wednesday - an estimate that, if accurate, would make the storm the nation's deadliest natural disaster since at least the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. |
Gulf Coast Declared Health Emergency WASHINGTON -- Federal officials declared a public health emergency for the entire Gulf Coast Wednesday, calling life in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina "very dangerous." |
| Bush Says Katrina Recovery to Take Years President Bush pledged Wednesday to do "all in our power" to save lives and provide sustenance to uncounted victims of Hurricane Katrina but cautioned that recovery of the Gulf Coast will take years. |
Katrina Refugees Headed to Houston Astrodome HOUSTON -- At least 25,000 of Hurricane Katrina's refugees, a majority of them at the New Orleans Superdome, will travel in a bus convoy to Houston and will be sheltered at the Astrodome, which hasn't been used for professional sporting events in years. |
| Around the World, Compassion - and Shock VIENNA, Austria (AP) - From papal prayers to telegrams from China, the world reacted with an outpouring of compassion Wednesday for the victims of Hurricane Katrina in messages tinged by shock that a disaster of this scale could occur in the United States. |
FEMA Calls on Homeland Security Workers for Help WASHINGTON — The Federal Emergency Management Agency is seeking 2,000 Homeland Security Department workers to spend two weeks carrying out duties in the area devastated by Hurricane Katrina . |
| Levee Repair Work has Yet to Begin Federal engineers said Wednesday that water from Lake Pontchartrain has stopped pouring into New Orleans over hurricane-damaged levees but acknowledged nothing has been done so far to fill the mammoth breaches. |
Looters Ransack City NEW ORLEANS (AP) - With law officers and National Guardsmen focused on saving lives, looters around the city spent another day Wednesday brazenly ransacking stores for food, beer, clothing, appliances - and guns.
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| 965 Dead in Baghdad Stampede BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- Deaths mounted steadily in northeast Baghdad after a massive midday Shiite religious procession erupted into a chaotic stampede Wednesday, causing the drowning and trampling deaths of 965 pilgrims. |
NBC U Slates Katrina Benefit The NBC Universal Television Group, which has been active in raising money during previous national disasters, has scheduled a live benefit special, A Concert For Hurricane Relief, in high-definition on NBC, MSNBC and CNBC at 8 p.m. Friday. |
| RFK Jr. Blames Katrina on Mississippi Governor As Hurricane Katrina dismantles Mississippi’s Gulf Coast, it’s worth recalling the central role that Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour played in derailing the Kyoto Protocol and kiboshing President Bush’s iron-clad campaign promise to regulate CO2. |
Moving Dead Becomes City's Second Priority NEW ORLEANS - When Xavier Bowie died in a flooded neighborhood, his common-law wife did the only thing she could think to do. She wrapped his body in a sheet, laid him on a makeshift bier of two-by-fours and, with a little help, floated him down to the main road. |
| Gasoline Futures Surge to Record High US gasoline futures surged to a record high on Wednesday after the Department of Energy reported a 500,000 barrel drop in gasoline inventories to 194.4m barrels as stocks fell for a ninth week in succession. |
Hurricane Raises Fears of Global Energy Crisis Fears of an international energy crisis mounted yesterday as the scale of human and economic devastation caused in the southern US by Hurricane Katrina became fully apparent. |
| Public Health Disaster in New Orleans NEW ORLEANS — As a public health catastrophe unfolded Wednesday in New Orleans, hospitals in the Crescent City sank further into disaster, airlifting babies without their parents to other states and struggling with more sick people appearing at their doors. |
Papal Telegram on Behalf of Hurricane Victims VATICAN CITY, AUG. 31, 2005 (Zenit.org).- Here is the telegram of sympathy, for the victims of Hurricane Katrina that hit the Gulf Coast of the United States, sent by Benedict XVI through Cardinal Angelo Sodano, Vatican Secretary of State, to the country's civil and ecclesiastical authorities. |
| Experts: Global Warming Didn't Cause Katrina It didn't take long for the media to blame the devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina on global warming, even though most climate experts dispute the idea. |
Carnival: Feds Ask About Using Ships MIAMI - Carnival Cruise Lines said Wednesday the federal government has asked whether its cruise ships could be used as emergency shelters or help Hurricane Katrina relief efforts in some other way. |
| Governor, Bishops Declare Day of Prayer WASHINGTON (CNS) -- Many Catholic churches and schools across Louisiana pitched in to provide meals, shelter and services for Gulf Coast refugees from Hurricane Katrina and from the massive flooding of New Orleans that followed -- one of the worst natural disasters ever to hit the United States. |
"We Are Overwhelmed," Says New Orleans Archbishop BATON ROUGE, Louisiana, AUG. 31, 2005 (Zenit.org).- Archbishop Alfred Hughes of New Orleans gathered with the governor of Louisiana and religious leaders to pray for the survivors and victims of Hurricane Katrina. |