Mid-City New Orleans after the levees were breeched, photo provided by Michael RiegeJournal Entry: Weight = none taken, the co-ed baby shower (a boy) given by Ms MoneyWalker and daughter MoneyWalker for daughter-in-law MoneyWalker was to mammoth in terms of rich food-- couldn’t face the transparency; Coinage = $2.05; Ground Scores = 5 including an excellent pair of heavy duty battery jumper cables.
Feature Entry: A Katrina Walk Five Years Later
Today marks the fifth anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. Because of multiple breaches in New Orleans’s levee system, 80 percent of New Orleans was flooded. More than 1,500 people lost their lives in our city. The MoneyWalker’s residence had more than five feet of water on the ground floor. What made this flood even more costly was New Orleans’s unique topography, much of the city is below flood level. In normal times, we keep the waters pushed back with elaborate levees and electric pumps. When the levees failed and the electric infrastructure stopped working, there was no place for the water to go. So it stayed, just putrefying in our homes from September 1 until October 4, the first day we were allowed to return. Our first floor was surreal, a scene from a horror movie could not have been more sobering. It took that long for levee repairs and portable generators to pump out the water. The recall still brings tears as these words are being typed. Ms. MoneyWalker and I wheeled out more than a thousand wheel barrow loads of water logged possessions, many treasures of a lifetime. We were not able to return as residents until March more than six months later. That was the month that electricity was restored to our block.
All of the memories came back on this morning’s walk.
Katrina walks are somber.
MoneyWalker
Thank you for posting. I have often wondered how you were affected by Katrina. Our news has had lots of New Orleans coverage in the last week and I've taken in most of it, always thinking of my friends, the MoneyWalkers.
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