[pulp] from the "National Geographic" October, 2004...

The storm hit Breton Sound with the fury of a nuclear warhead, pushing a deadly
storm surge into Lake Pontchartrain. The water crept to the top of the massive
berm that holds back the lake and then spilled over. Nearly 80 percent of New
Orleans lies below sea level—more than eight feet below in places—so the water
poured in. A liquid brown wall washed over the brick ranch homes of Gentilly,
over the clapboard houses of the Ninth Ward, over the white-columned porches of
the Garden District, until it raced through the bars and strip joints on
Bourbon Street like the pale rider of the Apocalypse. As it reached 25 feet
(eight meters) over parts of the city, people climbed onto roofs to escape it.

Thousands drowned in the murky brew that was soon contaminated by sewage and
industrial waste. Thousands more who survived the flood later perished from
dehydration and disease as they waited to be rescued. It took two months to
pump the city dry, and by then the Big Easy was buried under a blanket of
putrid sediment, a million people were homeless, and 50,000 were dead. It was
the worst natural disaster in the history of the United States.

When did this calamity happen? It hasn't—yet. But the doomsday scenario is not
far-fetched. The Federal Emergency Management Agency lists a hurricane strike
on New Orleans as one of the most dire threats to the nation, up there with a
large earthquake in California or a terrorist attack on New York City. Even the
Red Cross no longer opens hurricane shelters in the city, claiming the risk to
its workers is too great.

http://www3.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0410/feature5/index.html

****************************************************************** 
Whoever wishes to experience the 
truth of immediate life, must 
investigate its alienated form, 
the objective powers, which determine 
the individual existence into 
its innermost recesses. 

Adorno, MINIMA MORALIA

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