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Personal retrospective anniversary post - adapted from my old LiveJournal (migrated to Dreamwidth) post on the 1st anniversary, as I was too busy experiencing it to post about it at the time, with a few slight edits and some relevant photos added.
----
To backtrack just before...
Beverly, an old friend and former New Orleanian, and her sweetie, Girgl, the professor of physics from Germany, were staying at my place. The previous day other old friends were passing through town, Nancy & Harrison, moving out of Bay St. Louis on the Mississippi coast up to Arkansas. We and some other acquaintances all went to lunch at Sid-Mar's, on the Bucktown peninsula where the 17th Street Canal meets Lake Pontchartrain. (Spoiler, I mention this place specifically as less than a week later everything in the area would be gone.)
Photo by Infrogmation: What was left of Bucktown after we got back to town from evacuation.
My car brakes were sticking, I said maybe I should take it by a mechanic in the morning. Girgl said he'd take a look at it. He jammed the brake pedal hard and it stopped sticking. He said it was likely just a pebble caught in the mechanism, but it was fine now.
The tv news reported a category 1 hurricane named Katrina was heading towards the Florida Panhandle.
At night we had dinner at Mandina's in Mid City. (Spoiler, in a few days Mid-City New Orleans would be inundated in the Federal Flood when the levee system failed in the biggest engineering disaster in US history.)
Friday morning, 26 August 2005, I'd listened to the news on the radio this morning and not heard of any change about the hurricane.
I picked up my new business cards, the first ever with my just acquired self-phone number. I'd be leading my new band at the Miss Crescent City pageant the following day. I stopped by the Unitarian Church on Claiborne where the pageant would be. Ms Hollie was one of the organizers, and I checked out the venue and looked in on some of the rehearsal.
Photos by Ms Hollie: Interior of the Unitarian Universalist Church after we got back from evacuation.
Friday night I was playing trombone as a substitute with a jazz band on Decatur Street in the Quarter.
On break, a tourist remarked how much fun they were having, and they'd managed to change their flight to leave early the next day. Why's that, I asked. The hurricane is coming! Hurricane? Others who'd heard more recent news confirmed that Katrina had changed course and strengthened and was a potential threat to New Orleans. Might come here sometime after the weekend.
Saturday the 27th Ms Hollie and I were both in a bit of a tizzy. The morning news showed the storm looking even worse. Hollie was taking care of Pageant details, and I was taking care of things regarding the band, while contemplating that we may need to evacuate. I picked up the sandwiches for the band, unsuccessfully looking to fill my gas tank on the way-- stations either had long lines or had signs announcing they were out of gas. The band's drummer, Sue, called to say she couldn't make it as she'd been called to the State Museum to do their hurricane battoning down the hatches procedure. I unsuccessfully tried to get a sub, calling around thinking, "Oh no! A hurricane is coming, and I have to find a drummer!"
The band members -- sans drummer-- met at the trumpeter's house in Broadmoor, a short distance from the venue. (Spoiler, Broadmoor would soon be under deep water.) We'd planned to do a quick rehearsal, as the musicians I'd gathered had never played together as a group. We did no rehearsing, instead staring at the tv screen with a satellite image of a monster that seemed more than half the size of the whole Gulf of Mexico barrelling towards us.
On to the pageant. The band played some to fill time before anything else got started; Ms Hollie revealed that the MC didn't come into town from the North Shore due to the hurricane, and things had to be rearranged. The turn out was light but things went well considering the improvised nature. Fortunately the guitar and tuba were such good rhythm players that we overcame the lack of a drummer.
Before and after playing, the sax player, who managed a convenience store in the 7th Ward, was on his phone trying to finagle or bribe a gasoline tanker truck to make a run into town as the store had emptied their gas tanks early that morning. He was also instructing the staff to turn the freezer to maximum setting and put the perishables in it, as there might be a power outage. (Spoiler, this area of the 7th Ward would soon be in deep water.)
Photo by Jocelyn Augustino/FEMA, Aerial photo over the 7th Ward area 30 August 2005
After the pageant the co-organizer Margaret was going to drive straight to Dallas, and tried to foist off a whole pile of perishable food on Hollie and me. As I was trying to empty the refrigerator of perishables, most went right into a trash bag and the trash can. (Alas, the emptying of the fridge was not nearly complete enough, as would be revealed over 5 weeks later.)
Sue phoned to say the museum staff had made quick work of things and she was already in her car on the road to Texas.
I finally found an open gas station with not too terrible a line (they only had super; my car takes regular, but this wasn't the time to be too picky.)
Bev & Girgl were off somewhere (I later found another friend was taking them on a driving tour all around town-- in retrospect, very fitting). I closed up the house's storm shutters and packed up suitcases-- what we needed, then extra space filled with local collectables like jazzfest and art opening shirts.
Hollie and I then tried to unwind with a splash in the back yard inflatable pool and lying in the sun a bit-- it was a very beautiful late afternoon. Somehow, however, it seemed strangely quiet. I didn't realize until hearing other folks accounts later that most of the birds had already left town.
The Krewe of OAK Midsummer Mardi Gras Parade was in my neighborhood that night. Hollie and I were throwing together costumes when Bev & Girgl came back. I told them a major hurricane was coming, and they needed to pack up-- I'd check the weather service website at dawn, and if the storm hadn't changed course, they needed to get out. Girgl said, "This hurricane sounds very interesting. I have never seen one. I think I would like to stay and watch it."
".... No." I replied. "No, you don't. Nancy and Harrison want you to visit them in Arkansas; this is the time to go there."
We all went to OAK. The turn out was lighter than usual; many folks had already left town. We heard Mayor Nagin had issued a call for a voluntary evacuation. Some friends said they'd spent the day boarding up their house and packing, and planned to drive out after the party. One costumer had "KATRINA STAY AWAY" painted on them. It was a good parade party.
Beverly and Girgl at Krewe of OAK Mid-Summer 2005
Hollie and reveler at Krewe of OAK Mid-Summer 2005
Dancing in the streets of New Orleans, maybe for the last time, before evacuating.
Krewe of OAK Mid-Summer Mardi Gras 2005 photos by Infrogmation
Back home. Hollie needed to pick up her cell phone charger on the West Bank before leaving town. I said I didn't want to fight traffic in the morning; let's do it now. Traffic was light after midnight. Along Claiborne and Fountainebleau hundreds of cars were already parked up on the raised neutral grounds in hopes that the half foot of added elevation would protect them if there was flooding. (Spoiler, it wouldn't. )
We all got up before dawn on Sunday 28 August. Bev and Girgl drove out of town just before dawn. Hollie and I headed out about 40 minutes later, after I spent some time anxiously pacing around the house, double checking things, and throwing a few more possessions into the car.
Between the speed of the arrival of the storm and being busy, unlike evacuations for Andrew and Ivan I had no reservations nor definite destination. Maybe to my Brother in Gainesville, my parents who were staying in Jacksonville, or see if we can get a room somewhere beyond Tallahassee... just bug out. We headed east on I-10, on the high rise across the open water of the Rigoletts. Traffic was heavy but moving through Slidell, then pretty good thereafter. My car radio didn't work, but Hollie brought a portable. Somewhere in Mississippi we heard Mayor Nagin had made the evacuation mandatory, the first in the city's history. I was having a problem with my car's brakes-- every time I'd use them, they'd stick worse. It wasn't just a pebble, clearly. I had to jam on them repeatedly to get them unstuck. I tried to not worry Hollie by talking about the problem as an amusing minor annoyance, but she was not fooled.
At Tallahassee we stopped to eat and make some calls. My mother had already made us reservations in Jacksonville! She said she saw an ad in the paper with a good rate at the local Quality Inn, so she booked it. Peachy, thanks!
We made it to Jacksonville. I followed the directions-- it turns out it wasn't a Quality Inn as my mother thought, it was the "OK Quality Motel" or some such-- we looked at the room and the Quality was low indeed as fleas bit our ankles. We succeeded in finding a vacancy at a better motel nearby, and used one of the obvious defects of the room as an excuse to cancel the reservation at the first place.
The next morning, Monday the 29th, at the complementary motel breakfast the lobby tv was on showing satellite images of the hurricane coming ashore at South East Louisiana. One fellow evacuee from the area was for some reason insisting that the storm wasn't going to be hitting shore until that evening (I think that had been the prediction a day or so earlier, but the tv was clearly showing otherwise). I was trying to find a brake repair place when my parents arranged to move us to a better hotel-- with internet access (Yay). We repacked and moved to the other hotel. As we were unpacking the car Hollie got a call from Tal, who said he heard a report of those dreaded words: a levee break. A bit later, a report mentioned flooding somewhere in the 9th Ward. "Sounds like a rerun of Betsy", I sighed.
I took the car to get the brakes fixed. When it was ready, the mechanics wanted to joke at length that the Superdome now had a new skylight.
And so began my evacuation.
----
To backtrack just before...
Beverly, an old friend and former New Orleanian, and her sweetie, Girgl, the professor of physics from Germany, were staying at my place. The previous day other old friends were passing through town, Nancy & Harrison, moving out of Bay St. Louis on the Mississippi coast up to Arkansas. We and some other acquaintances all went to lunch at Sid-Mar's, on the Bucktown peninsula where the 17th Street Canal meets Lake Pontchartrain. (Spoiler, I mention this place specifically as less than a week later everything in the area would be gone.)
Photo by Infrogmation: What was left of Bucktown after we got back to town from evacuation.
My car brakes were sticking, I said maybe I should take it by a mechanic in the morning. Girgl said he'd take a look at it. He jammed the brake pedal hard and it stopped sticking. He said it was likely just a pebble caught in the mechanism, but it was fine now.
The tv news reported a category 1 hurricane named Katrina was heading towards the Florida Panhandle.
At night we had dinner at Mandina's in Mid City. (Spoiler, in a few days Mid-City New Orleans would be inundated in the Federal Flood when the levee system failed in the biggest engineering disaster in US history.)
Friday morning, 26 August 2005, I'd listened to the news on the radio this morning and not heard of any change about the hurricane.
I picked up my new business cards, the first ever with my just acquired self-phone number. I'd be leading my new band at the Miss Crescent City pageant the following day. I stopped by the Unitarian Church on Claiborne where the pageant would be. Ms Hollie was one of the organizers, and I checked out the venue and looked in on some of the rehearsal.
Photos by Ms Hollie: Interior of the Unitarian Universalist Church after we got back from evacuation.
Friday night I was playing trombone as a substitute with a jazz band on Decatur Street in the Quarter.
On break, a tourist remarked how much fun they were having, and they'd managed to change their flight to leave early the next day. Why's that, I asked. The hurricane is coming! Hurricane? Others who'd heard more recent news confirmed that Katrina had changed course and strengthened and was a potential threat to New Orleans. Might come here sometime after the weekend.
Saturday the 27th Ms Hollie and I were both in a bit of a tizzy. The morning news showed the storm looking even worse. Hollie was taking care of Pageant details, and I was taking care of things regarding the band, while contemplating that we may need to evacuate. I picked up the sandwiches for the band, unsuccessfully looking to fill my gas tank on the way-- stations either had long lines or had signs announcing they were out of gas. The band's drummer, Sue, called to say she couldn't make it as she'd been called to the State Museum to do their hurricane battoning down the hatches procedure. I unsuccessfully tried to get a sub, calling around thinking, "Oh no! A hurricane is coming, and I have to find a drummer!"
The band members -- sans drummer-- met at the trumpeter's house in Broadmoor, a short distance from the venue. (Spoiler, Broadmoor would soon be under deep water.) We'd planned to do a quick rehearsal, as the musicians I'd gathered had never played together as a group. We did no rehearsing, instead staring at the tv screen with a satellite image of a monster that seemed more than half the size of the whole Gulf of Mexico barrelling towards us.
On to the pageant. The band played some to fill time before anything else got started; Ms Hollie revealed that the MC didn't come into town from the North Shore due to the hurricane, and things had to be rearranged. The turn out was light but things went well considering the improvised nature. Fortunately the guitar and tuba were such good rhythm players that we overcame the lack of a drummer.
Before and after playing, the sax player, who managed a convenience store in the 7th Ward, was on his phone trying to finagle or bribe a gasoline tanker truck to make a run into town as the store had emptied their gas tanks early that morning. He was also instructing the staff to turn the freezer to maximum setting and put the perishables in it, as there might be a power outage. (Spoiler, this area of the 7th Ward would soon be in deep water.)
Photo by Jocelyn Augustino/FEMA, Aerial photo over the 7th Ward area 30 August 2005
After the pageant the co-organizer Margaret was going to drive straight to Dallas, and tried to foist off a whole pile of perishable food on Hollie and me. As I was trying to empty the refrigerator of perishables, most went right into a trash bag and the trash can. (Alas, the emptying of the fridge was not nearly complete enough, as would be revealed over 5 weeks later.)
Sue phoned to say the museum staff had made quick work of things and she was already in her car on the road to Texas.
I finally found an open gas station with not too terrible a line (they only had super; my car takes regular, but this wasn't the time to be too picky.)
Bev & Girgl were off somewhere (I later found another friend was taking them on a driving tour all around town-- in retrospect, very fitting). I closed up the house's storm shutters and packed up suitcases-- what we needed, then extra space filled with local collectables like jazzfest and art opening shirts.
Hollie and I then tried to unwind with a splash in the back yard inflatable pool and lying in the sun a bit-- it was a very beautiful late afternoon. Somehow, however, it seemed strangely quiet. I didn't realize until hearing other folks accounts later that most of the birds had already left town.
The Krewe of OAK Midsummer Mardi Gras Parade was in my neighborhood that night. Hollie and I were throwing together costumes when Bev & Girgl came back. I told them a major hurricane was coming, and they needed to pack up-- I'd check the weather service website at dawn, and if the storm hadn't changed course, they needed to get out. Girgl said, "This hurricane sounds very interesting. I have never seen one. I think I would like to stay and watch it."
".... No." I replied. "No, you don't. Nancy and Harrison want you to visit them in Arkansas; this is the time to go there."
We all went to OAK. The turn out was lighter than usual; many folks had already left town. We heard Mayor Nagin had issued a call for a voluntary evacuation. Some friends said they'd spent the day boarding up their house and packing, and planned to drive out after the party. One costumer had "KATRINA STAY AWAY" painted on them. It was a good parade party.
Beverly and Girgl at Krewe of OAK Mid-Summer 2005
Hollie and reveler at Krewe of OAK Mid-Summer 2005
Dancing in the streets of New Orleans, maybe for the last time, before evacuating.
Krewe of OAK Mid-Summer Mardi Gras 2005 photos by Infrogmation
Back home. Hollie needed to pick up her cell phone charger on the West Bank before leaving town. I said I didn't want to fight traffic in the morning; let's do it now. Traffic was light after midnight. Along Claiborne and Fountainebleau hundreds of cars were already parked up on the raised neutral grounds in hopes that the half foot of added elevation would protect them if there was flooding. (Spoiler, it wouldn't. )
We all got up before dawn on Sunday 28 August. Bev and Girgl drove out of town just before dawn. Hollie and I headed out about 40 minutes later, after I spent some time anxiously pacing around the house, double checking things, and throwing a few more possessions into the car.
Between the speed of the arrival of the storm and being busy, unlike evacuations for Andrew and Ivan I had no reservations nor definite destination. Maybe to my Brother in Gainesville, my parents who were staying in Jacksonville, or see if we can get a room somewhere beyond Tallahassee... just bug out. We headed east on I-10, on the high rise across the open water of the Rigoletts. Traffic was heavy but moving through Slidell, then pretty good thereafter. My car radio didn't work, but Hollie brought a portable. Somewhere in Mississippi we heard Mayor Nagin had made the evacuation mandatory, the first in the city's history. I was having a problem with my car's brakes-- every time I'd use them, they'd stick worse. It wasn't just a pebble, clearly. I had to jam on them repeatedly to get them unstuck. I tried to not worry Hollie by talking about the problem as an amusing minor annoyance, but she was not fooled.
At Tallahassee we stopped to eat and make some calls. My mother had already made us reservations in Jacksonville! She said she saw an ad in the paper with a good rate at the local Quality Inn, so she booked it. Peachy, thanks!
We made it to Jacksonville. I followed the directions-- it turns out it wasn't a Quality Inn as my mother thought, it was the "OK Quality Motel" or some such-- we looked at the room and the Quality was low indeed as fleas bit our ankles. We succeeded in finding a vacancy at a better motel nearby, and used one of the obvious defects of the room as an excuse to cancel the reservation at the first place.
The next morning, Monday the 29th, at the complementary motel breakfast the lobby tv was on showing satellite images of the hurricane coming ashore at South East Louisiana. One fellow evacuee from the area was for some reason insisting that the storm wasn't going to be hitting shore until that evening (I think that had been the prediction a day or so earlier, but the tv was clearly showing otherwise). I was trying to find a brake repair place when my parents arranged to move us to a better hotel-- with internet access (Yay). We repacked and moved to the other hotel. As we were unpacking the car Hollie got a call from Tal, who said he heard a report of those dreaded words: a levee break. A bit later, a report mentioned flooding somewhere in the 9th Ward. "Sounds like a rerun of Betsy", I sighed.
I took the car to get the brakes fixed. When it was ready, the mechanics wanted to joke at length that the Superdome now had a new skylight.
And so began my evacuation.
