Hurricane Katrina Survivor Experience

My name is Jim Martin. When Hurricane Katrina struck on Aug 29 2005, I lived at 1719 Jackson Ave in Uptown New Orleans. I lived in the twenty percent of New Orleans that did not flood when the levees broke. I remained in New Orleans for six days after Katrina struck.

I left aboard a bus on Sunday, September 4 and arrived in Geneva Alabama on Monday afternoon, September 5. After Katrina struck on Monday and the levees broke on Tuesday August 30, flooding eighty percent of the city, I found myself and my roommate, Marquis Dye, 29, left trapped, abandoned and stranded, afoot and unable to escape.

Sunday night, August 28, I slept through the hurricane. I lived in a small one story apt between two large three story houses. My two roommates and a dog slept in the front room and I slept in the back bedroom. I did not hear the winds howling around the corners of the house.

I awoke Monday morning and walked to my front door. I looked out and the water was running like a river down the street. It drained away from the river north toward Lake Ponchartrain However, by sundown that water had drained away and left water only in the gutters on either side of the street. One of my roommates, Calvin Dawson, 39, who had been living with us for only a few weeks, decided he had better make good his escape. He disappeared early that morning and we have not seen or heard from him since. He hitchhiked out of New Orleans before the two levees broke. I later discovered his photo and interview on the internet on the City Pages of St. Paul Minneapolis Minnesota.

The electricity had gone off during the night caused by falling tree limbs blown by the wind and rain. Marquis and his pit bulldog named Dolly and I found ourselves witnessing that day the looting of the local Wal Mart, located seventeen blocks from our apartment on Tchoupitoulas Street by the Mississippi River. We saw dozens and dozens of black people of all ages, shapes and sizes, and a few whites, pushing shopping carts full of beer, soft drinks, bottled water, 2 whiskey, wine down the street from the direction of Wal Mart toward their homes past our block. We saw very few police cars that Monday and the four following days.

That Monday morning I decided to walk about the neighborhood in the affluent section called the lower Garden District. I walked up Jackson Avenue and saw a large old live oak tree that the wind had felled next to the Ramada Inn. It fell toward St Charles Avenue, sprawled on the sidewalk blocking pedestrian traffic. I walked to the intersection of St Charles and Jackson, one and a half blocks from my apt. I walked down St Charles toward Lee Circle on the neutral ground between the inbound and outbound streetcar tracks. I saws dozens of crepe myrtle bushes uprooted and felled on the streetcar tracks or on the street next to them. Broken tree limbs littered sidewalks, store fronts and the streets on either side of the streetcar tracks. Large tree limbs had fallen and blocked the streets, making passage by vehicles impossible.

I chanced to meet with one of my acquaintances named Troy, an elderly man with a small, wiry frame and no teeth, whose face and body indicated the ravages of years of alcohol abuse/consumption. He proved articulate and intelligent when I had met him a few months earlier, and he and I had become friendly. Our tour covered the area between Lee Circle and Jackson Ave and St Charles and Magazine Streets, called the Lower Garden District. We walked around surveying the damage to trees, shrubs, flower beds, houses, apartments, windows and business structures.

We saw one two story house that had been under extensive renovation collapsed now beyond repair. We saw countless piles of limbs from the old, large, umbrella style branches of live oak trees at the park that sets next to Magazine Street.

We found ourselves with jaws dropped when we would see a house with a window blown out or roof shingles missing or a tree limb fallen on a roof, next to a house that stood untouched. Troy soon tired of walking and I continued alone. I crossed over Jackson and entered the wealthier residential section with larger and more architecturally impressive homes.

I had to step over and step around countless tree limbs. I saw giant ancient live oak and magnolia trees that had stood since the 19th Century topped across streets. Broken and downed power lines and cable tv and phone wires lay along every street on both sides. I greeted a few white elderly men who had remained behind to protect their homes and property, raking leaves or picking up limbs on their front yards or lawns. I did not realize what I had slept through.

I have lived in New Orleans since 1991 and I had never seen this much damage to homes, property and trees in any previous hurricanes. The streets were relatively dry. I saw a few low spots at street corners and intersections covered in water.

I returned home to spend time with Marquis and his dog. We had some canned food in the house. The previous night I had filled the bathtub with water and collected water in glass mayonnaise jars. The gas stove continued to operate. I could boil water and wash dishes. My telephone still worked, to my great surprise. I called my sister in Utah and told her we were still all in one piece but scared because of the many looters in the neighborhood. She said she would pray for me. I told her I would call her back if conditions worsened. They did.

I stayed with the apartment while Marquis walked about scavenging any canned goods, bottled water, and soft drinks and fruit juice that looters had dropped in their flight from the Williams Grocery on the corner of St Charles and Jackson, or from the Walgreen’s four blocks down the street or from Zara’s Supermarket on Prytania Street, four blocks from our place.

I last saw Marquis on Friday morning when he went down to the Convention Center to fetch some water that his foster father, who lives in New Mexico, had told him he could retrieve, according to reports he had seen on tv. Marquis took his dog and apparently found himself effectively kidnaped. I later called his foster father and he said Marquis had made it to Albequerque, and was living in an apartment paid for with FEMA funds.

I escaped on Sunday, September 4, after another of my neighbors and I walked down to the Superdome with our luggage and caught a bus to Jackson, Mississippi. I had learned anew what fear means.

Troy and I stopped at a large house on a corner that contained several apts. He walked up the stairs attached to the rear of the house. A giant cluster of plaintain trees grew next to the landing at the top of the stairs. A large cluster of mature but green plaintains lay awaiting somebody to pick and take them home to cook. The hurricane’s winds and waters had lopped off the top heavy limbs. The naked and exposed trunks lay open to the elements. We turned at the top of the landing and then turned into a door that opened into a small shotgun apt. The front room, the kitchen and the bathroom lay arranged like a shotgun apt, one beside the other. Litter and trash covered the floors.

Troy said that Michel, a slumlord who owned the C-Note Lounge in the 1700 block of St Charles Av, owned this house, but had long since abandoned it to squatters and homeless folks like himself. He had been sleeping in it a nights. The electricity and water had long since been shut off. The roofs miraculously did not leak, to my surprise. We quickly walked back outside and down the stairs to continue our tour of the devastation.

We continued our trek toward Jackson Av. We passed more apts and individual large homes that had sustained some roof shingles missing, tree limbs crashed onto front porches and front and side yards, and vehicles that had escape damage when a tree trunk or limb fell next to them. Some crepe myrtles lay on their side with the roots exposed and the ground open where the roots had erupted. Some windows in first and second story houses and apts had blown in and some had cracked. Some indicated tape placed in an X by thoughtful owners or tenants.

Old and weak roofs had sagged on some houses. Houses with fresh paint jobs and well maintained woodwork had survived the ravages of water and wind. One house on Thalia st that was old and dilapidated sported its outer two story wall collapsed onto the street and sidewalk. I saw that same house later on tv and have seen it since as a still photo in several websites. I saw it fresh the morning after it had fallen to the ravages of time, neglect and Katrina’s power.

At the corner of Magazine and Thalia, just a few doors down from that house, a vacant lot on one corner set next to a tall old white two story mansion that had fallen victim to a fire a year or so earlier. It suffered even more fallen timbers and sagging roofs after Katrina. The fire dept had doused the fire and left the hull of the charred timbers. The absentee owners had abandoned the site. MSNBC later used that vacant lot and that burned out house with its white wood and charred timbers as a backdrop for live broadcasts. I saw it several nights in September when I watched live and taped broadcasts from Uptown and the Lower Garden District.

By the time we neared Zara’s supermarket at the + of Prytania and St Mary St, Troy said he wanted to go elsewhere and meet up with a man who had offered him some work the previous day. I continued on alone and crossed over Jackson Av. More felled live oaks, crepe myrtles, and magnolia trees impeded my path as I passed by the old wooden mansions with their white paint jobs. I had to zig and zag from one side of the street to the other and walk along sidewalks littered with acorns and other seeds from the various trees and ornamental shrubs. Limbs large and small had fallen atop flower beds filled with summer annuals and perennials. I spoke with a few people who were sightseeing like me. Most of them lived in the neighborhood and I had seen them at the grocery or the drug store. I asked them about their losses or damages and they asked me about mine.

I walked along the streets between Prytania and Magazine, heading uptown. One large live oak tree had fallen across the street, leaving a giant gaping hole that broke the sidewalk and mashed it into dozens of large pieces. I said to the man who was working in his yard by that\r\ntree, “somebody with a chainsaw will have a big job reducing that tree to workable size pieces.”\r\nSeveral large live oaks, magnolias and dozens of crepe myrtle bushes and other ornamental and\r\nnative shrubs at trees in yards and sidewalks lay uprooted across wrought iron fences and white\r\npicket fences. Every street in every block lay covered with trees, limbs, leaves and other debris.\r\nOne particularly large and tall sycamore tree had fallen into the street. White residents who had\r\nstayed combed and scoured their yards and then walked around as I did to scout the damage. \r\nI saw black males and black couples walking around gaping in awe much as I did.\r\n I continued walking down until I reached a large Catholic church near the corner of Magazine\r\nand Napoleon. An elderly man was raking leaves in the yard of the rectory next to the church. He\r\nsaid his name was Mr. Ott. I helped him pick up leaves and rake trash and then I stuffed it into\r\nblack plastic garbage bags he had brought from his house. We conversed about the disaster. He\r\nand I walked around to the other side of the church and entered the yard of a lady who lived next \r\nto the church. She greeted us and he and she talked about her making contact with her children \r\nwho lived in another state. She looked and sounded as if she had suffered a stroke and sustained\r\nsome speech impediment as a consequence. She walked with a feeble gait. We removed a wooden picket fence from the front of her property that had collapsed and fallen, blocking the\r\nsidewalk. We then walked around the church through the churchyard and walked past one house\r\nbehind the church. The second house behind the church, we turned into a driveway and walked up to the rear of Mr Ott’s house. He opened the rear wooden gate for me and invited me in. He\r\nlived in a small cluttered white wooden frame shotgun house. I asked him if I could use his phone to call my sister, Connie Douras, in Utah. We talked briefly and I thanked him for the use of his phone. I\r\nsaid I would return tomorrow to check on him. I did. 7\r\n I began walking back toward my place. I ran upon two young men in their late 20s who were\r\nusing a chain saw to clear some crepe myrtle bushes that had fallen across the street. I helped \r\nthem jerk, yank and pull the bushes. One of the fellows operated the chain saw and then the other\r\none and I hauled the bushes to the sidewalk and deposited them. After he had finished cutting all\r\nhe could reach, the three of us moved all the loose branches to the sidewalk. They returned to\r\ntheir truck and continued driving down the street, avoiding branches and trees as the zigged and\r\nzagged slowly from one side of the street to the other. I soon lost sight of them. \r\n Everywhere I looked I saw thousands of tree limbs, with loose leaves littering every street, and large, medium and small live oaks, magnolia, and many varieties of shrubs and bushes in\r\nyards and along sidewalks torn asunder or ripped from the ground. Some tree roots looked like\r\na giant octopus that the hurricane had blown in and beached. The stiff bare roots of trees and\r\ncrepe myrtle bushes rose in the air like a giant octopus with rigor mortis setting in. \r\n I made my way back to my place at 1719 Jackson av. Marquis had been out doing some\r\nsurveying of his own with his pit bull, Dolly. Marquis and I spent our days in the heat and the\r\nhumidity watching the parade of humanity passing by our front door with the goods they had\r\nlooted from Walgreen’s and Wal Mart and the other smaller neighborhood groceries. \r\n The parade of looters pushing plastic shopping carts from stores began Monday as soon as the\r\nwinds and waters subsided and continued for days until they exhausted whatever they found in\r\nevery store. First I saw black males and females carrying cases of beer, wine, whiskey and other\r\nalcoholic beverages. Then they would return and bring even more buggies filled with cases of \r\nsoft drinks and bottled water. Next they brought canned food and other packaged foods. They at\r\nleast had their priorities in order. They carried sacks and cans of dog and cat food. \r\n Marquis and other eyewitnesses who lived in the neighborhood who stopped by to converse 8\r\nwith us said they saw dozens of people raiding the pharmacy at Walgreen in the 1800 block of\r\nSt Charles. They broke the glass on the front door and rushed to the back. They broke the glass in\r\nthe rear of the store that provided a drive through prescription pickup service. They stripped the\r\nshelves of every prescription drug in the place, people said. They conducted these raids the very\r\nfirst move they made on Monday, in order to secure cash while people willing to pay cash for \r\nthese drugs still remained in town to purchase them. \r\n On Tuesday I saw a pickup truck loaded with several 52\" tv sets from the Wal Mart. Several\r\nblack males stood in the back of the truck in the space on either side of the goods while three others set in the front. I did not see where or how they were going to play these items with no\r\nelectricity. I did not see whom they would barter these items with for other more sorely needed \r\nitems. After the residents had retrieved or looted all the drugs, liquor, water and food, in that \r\norder, from the grocery outlets, they then began bringing electronic items and other non-food and\r\nluxury items. Some brought canned and bagged dog and cat food, enough to last for a long haul. \r\n By Tuesday, the bravest of the brave black teenagers had already broken into the various car\r\ndealerships, broken into the rooms containing the keys and stolen luxury vehicles. One vehicle particularly struck my fancy. A black teenage male had stolen a brand new purple Cadillac. He\r\ndrove it back and forth past my place several times in the daylight. After a few hours I noticed he\r\nstopped passing by. I could only conclude that he had run it out of gas and he had returned to \r\nacquire another one. I saw several brand new pickup trucks with the dealer papers still stuck to\r\nthe interior windows on the passengers side without tags, driven by teenagers and other youths in\r\ntheir early twenties. These trucks would pass by the house a few times over a few hours and then\r\nsuddenly disappear. I again surmised the same fate for all these vehicles. An empty gas tank led\r\nthe driver to march back to his original joy ride, steal another and head out with a full tank. 9\r\n The electricity died during the early morning hours of Monday as the winds and rains pelted us. I used my Radio Shack portable radio that had some old batteries in it for the rest of the time I\r\nremained at my place. I want to offer some evidence of what I can only believe and claim are\r\nmiracles during six of the longest days of my life. First, the old batteries in that radio stayed alive\r\nfrom Mon Aug 29 until the following Sun, Sept 4, when I finally left my place and evacuated NO. Second, my telephone service with Bell South never went down. Third, I had natural gas service and could use my stove to cook and boil water until I left. Fourth, nothing happened to my place in terms of structural damage due to high winds or heavy rains or flooding. I can claim I live a charmed life, or I can go spiritual and claim, as my sister, Connie, who called me from Price Utah and said that “a lot of people are praying for angels to surround and guard your house.” Apparently some body or some angels guarded my place and kept Marquis and me and his dog safe for those six days. \r\n Marquis did show a few signs of excessive stress and difficulty coping. He called his foster\r\nfather in New Mexico and later a tv station from there called him and he broke down and \r\nconfessed he was encountering difficulty coping. He left the house each day and returned with\r\nsome food or water or other items we needed, including dog food. He said he picked up some\r\nitems that looters had dropped from their full arms in their haste as they ran from stores that still contained useful items. \r\n I lost my appetite on Mon and did not recover it for the entire six days. I kept up my spirits by\r\ndeliberately staying in or near the house or setting on the front porch. Since we saw very few\r\npolice cars driving by our place after Monday, I grew more and more fearful each day that some\r\nof the looters who did not know me or who did not live in our neighborhood might rob us. \r\n On Tuesday morn, I again returned to visit Mr Ott at his place. I knocked on his back door 10\r\nlate that morning. He had deteriorated since Monday. I could see the fear and stress in his eyes.\r\nHe was feeble and frail, tall and slim with a pale complexion and wrinkled skin. He said he had\r\nheard that the levees had broken and the city government had already announced a mandatory\r\nevacuation. He said his son who lived in Texas was on his way to pick him up and take him out\r\nof town. As I talked to him while I stood just inside his back door, suddenly I heard the sound of\r\na passenger jet flying low. I walked outside and looked up just in time to see a full sized passenger jet about one thousand feet in the air flying slow and low. It flew directly over my head so I could not read the writing on the side. I only saw the underbelly of the plane. Only later that day on WWL AM 870 radio news did I learn that plane was Air Force One, which contained President George W Bush, who was returning from his vacation in Texas and Arizona. Bush had played golf at a golf course in Arizona the day after Katrina struck. A Google search on the\r\ninternet with the subject line “Bush played golf the day after Katrina struck” will offer several\r\nthousand hits. I looked it up several weeks ago. \r\n I quickly left Mr Ott and walked back to our place. I told Marquis that Mr Ott had told me the\r\nlevees broke Tuesday morning. Marquis and I agreed we needed to call somebody out of town to\r\nhelp up plan our evacuation in the near future. He called his father and I called Dwight Pridgen,\r\nmy best friend, who lives in Montgomery and serves as the assistant director of the Alabama state department of revenue. I called Mrs Jean Broxson at Oak Grove Mall restaurant and told her that I was scared and I needed to ask people around Oak Grove and Hartford and in the state of\r\nAlabama to call local, state and national politicians to send us some help in some form. Sheri\r\nInfinger, a young lady in her late 20s who works as a cook and waitress for Mrs Broxson, over\r\nheard the conversation and called one of her best friends, Amy Pollard, who works the morning\r\nshow from 6 to 10 am on WTVY FM 95, the Dothan country music station w/100,000 watts. \r\nShortly after I called Oak Grove Mall, Amy called me late Tuesday and said she had heard about our plight from Sheri Enfinger at Oak Grove mall. I asked her if she was kin to the Pollard family from Oak Grove and Hartford. She said she was married to Doug Pollard, the son of Jimmy Pollard. Jimmy and I had attended Oak Grove school when he was in the first grade and I was in third. We really then began to enjoy hearing each other’s voices. I told her about my father’s long\r\nacquaintanceship with Jim Tom Pollard, Jimmy’s father and her husband’s grandfather. She said\r\nshe would call me Wed morning live on the air and we could talk and let people hear about the\r\ndire straits we were in without any support from the military or outside law enforcement yet. She\r\ndid. She introduced me to the audience as Jimmy Martin, the name I grew up with, so that every\r\none who had known me in my childhood could identify who I was when they heard my voice and\r\nname. I said that I wanted people in Alabama to call Senators Richard Shelby and Jeff Sessions\r\nand call Representative Terry Everett and call Bush at the White House and Cheney and tell them\r\nto send us some help in New Orleans. I said I was truly scared and we all needed some help. She\r\nasked me what people needed and I told her if anybody wanted to send anything they should send\r\ncanned foods plus can openers and bottled water, flashlights and batteries and other non-perishable items. She said people in all of the counties of Southeast Alabama were collecting food and water and other items on trucks at court houses, police and sheriff’s departments and churches and were heading our way. I told her to tell all those folks thanks a lot. She asked me\r\nwhat part of town I lived in and what the situation looked like in my immediate vicinity. I told\r\nher about the looting and about my own fears that some of the looters might turn on me and \r\ncome into my house and take all the water and food that Marquis had scavenged and collected at\r\ngreat personal risk to his own health and safety. \r\n I called WSFA-tv in Montgomery, since I knew Bob Howell, the news director of many 11\r\nyears, whom I had known since our high school days. He graduated from Geneva Hi in 1966 and is one year younger than I am. The lady who answered the ph said he was not in the office. She recorded my conversation with her and I never knew if they broadcast it on their news that day. \r\n A lady from Fox News called me on Tuesday. She said that Amy Pollard had called her and\r\ngiven her my name, number and our dramatic circumstances. I very quickly told her I did not want to talk to her because I did not like Rupert Murdoch and I did not like Fox News. I burned\r\nher ears with a third degree burn, I hope. Thankfully I never heard from her or Fox again.\r\n A few minutes later I called CNN and a lady said someone would call me later. A lady then\r\ncalled me an hour or so later. She said she wanted to ask some questions on background. She\r\nrecorded our conversation but I never knew if she mentioned anything about us on any broadcast.\r\n I called Geneva County Sheriff Greg Ward on Wednesday and asked him if he could contact\r\nsome military or state police or some law enforcement authority somewhere and put my name of\r\na list for evacuation. He said he could not contact anyone in Louisiana through any means. He\r\nsaid my phone contact with him was the only communication into the storm damage area he had\r\nsince Katrina had struck. He said he was himself coming to Mississippi and maybe Louisiana in a\r\nday or so. I called him back Thursday and he said he had contacted the Geneva National Guard\r\nand told them to tell somebody in New Orleans to put my name on a list of people who needed\r\nevacuation. He said some guard units from Geneva, Hartford, Slocomb and Samson were headed\r\nto Miss and La to help. I had known Greg Ward when he was in junior high at Geneva high. \r\n Then I called Geneva County Probate Judge Harry Adkison, who said he was glad and relieved to hear from me. I asked him to do for me the same thing I had done with all the others\r\nI had called: notify a politician or politicians or law enforcement to send people help in NO and\r\nMiss. He called me back the next day to check on me and see if I had made any progress in 13 \r\nterms of making good my escape from NO. I told him whom I had contacted some people and what Greg Ward said. My high school classmate, Glenda Shelton Lichaa, who lives on Staten Island in New York City, called and said she wanted to check on me and see what had happened to me. I told her I was waiting very patiently but increasingly anxiously and stressfully for rescue. \r\n As each day and each hour passed from Monday morning Aug 29 to Sun Sept 4, I could tell\r\nmy spirits changed, my appetite changed, my digestive system changed and my world changed. \r\nAfter Marquis began to fall apart and start his minor panic attacks, and after he called his father\r\nand fell apart over the phone to him, we both began to realize that we could not continued in this\r\nvein. I tried very hard to remain cool, calm and collected.. Marquis did his best each day to leave\r\nthe house and spend several hours scavenging for whatever canned or packaged non-perishable\r\nfoods and non-food items he could find, scattered outside the doors of looted stores and along the\r\npaths of people who had left stores with arms overstuffed and dropped miscellaneous items. He\r\nsaid on one ocassion a truck full of armed deputy sheriffs from one of the parishes in LA had\r\nspotted him with a plastic bag of food and other items. He said every one of them pointed their\r\nweapons at him. He said one of them said I have a bullet with your name on it. He said he told\r\nhim, “My named is spelled M-A-R-Q-U-I-S.” He said he could not resist that temptation to strike\r\nback at this manifestation of colossal redneckedness. He fully realized the misplaced authority\r\nthat the situation had inadvertently bestowed upon these underqualified, untrained and overarmed deputies, or pickup trucks full of redneck sheriff’s deputies toting loaded shotguns, as he phrased it. I saw several truck loads of such rednecks pass by on our street on Tuesday and Wednesday\r\nand Thursday. Only on Friday did I finally see some evidence of National Guard troops in their\r\ndeuce and a half trucks. I sat for hours in the evening after sundown and listened to WWL radio. Marquis and I and his pit bull, Molly, would sit on the front porch and marvel at the miracle 14\r\nand the joy of seeing stars in the sky for the first time since I had begun living in NO since May 1991. \r\n Marquis and Molly on Tuesday drove off some potential black youthful looters who had climbed the wooden fence behind our place and broken into the apartment in the rear of our\r\nhouse. Then later that same day they drove off yet another young black looter who was trying to\r\nbreak and enter into the rear of the three story house at 1715 St Charles next door to our place.\r\nMarquis said one of the looters had ducked under our house. Molly and he flushed him out and\r\ndrove him off, however. \r\n After Marquis left Friday morning, I came to realize with each passing hour that I was on my\r\nown in two senses. First, he would not return, and second, I had to make my own arrangements to remove myself from the premises and make good my escape from the lost city of New Orleans. To say that I prayed is to say that I breathed. \r\n Marquis and I both encountered difficulty sleeping in the house at night. We had to lock the\r\nfront door in self-defense. We opened the window that opened onto the front porch, the window\r\nin my room and the kitchen window. In my room I could smell natural gas, at times stronger than \r\nothers. The still uncirculating hot air in the rooms at night prevented us from deep restful sleep.\r\nAs each day passed, my spirits grew weaker and my fears grew stronger. I did not drop into any\r\nkind of clinical depression, but I could feel my physical body weakening. My blood pressure rose\r\nwith each day, due to the oppressive heat and my growing sense of impatience and desperation\r\nas I slowly realized nobody was coming to my front door to rescue me. I grew to understand the\r\nmeaning of the concept: “You are own your own. The government or your government is not going to help you.” That realistic attitude gave me cold comfort in the ninety plus heat, however. Thursday Sept 1, I saw a pickup truck load of Louisiana deputy sheriffs riding by, each armed\r\nwith a loaded single barrel shotgun. I flagged the driver down in front of the house and he stopped. I asked them the usual questions: Who could I call to get my name on a list for rescue?\r\nCould they take down my name and address and phone and contact somebody to come pick me\r\nup? They mentioned something about contacting the National Guard. I asked them when are the\r\nNational Guard and the Army going to arrive. I asked them this question on the fourth day after\r\nKatrina hit. They did not write down my name or take any notes. They gave me a pair of blue\r\nlatex gloves and a pint of bottled water and told me to stay close to my house and be careful about what I touch. I shook hands with the deputy riding shotgun and thanked them. Then I\r\nwanted to shake hands with one of the deputies sitting right behind the passenger seat, but he had his hands on his shotgun. I declined. I thanked all of them for their hard work and sacrifice. They\r\ndrove off and I walked back and sat down on the porch in the late afternoon sun and listened to\r\nWWL radio.\r\n Marquis made an issue of a brutal and callous remark that Jefferson Parish President Aaron\r\nBroussard had made on Tuesday morning on the radio. He said, “There are no shelters in Jefferson Parish.” He said it over and over in the form of a mantra. We both appreciated the cruel\r\nand dark irony of this white politician giving in no uncertain terms to the listening surviving public of New Orleans the news that they could find no shelter for themselves in Jefferson Parish. I translated his cold and hard remark as another form of “you are own your own.” \r\n Hurricane Katrina carved in stone for me what I have said about New Orleans for years: If it involves intelligence, organization and efficiency, it’s not New Orleans. \r\n Sunday morning I flagged down some National Guard personnel riding a truck. I asked them\r\nhow I could make arrangements to leave. They took my name and number on a piece of paper\r\nand said they would contact somebody. Nobody ever came. The said I could walk somewhere and find somebody in authority and tell them I had a medical condition They said that news would gain me some attention and would help me escape sooner. I said, “I can create one.” I told\r\nthem I have bronchitis, and anyone who has ever had bronchitis knows it never goes away fully.\r\nIt goes into remission, and re-erupts under the right circumstances. They said, “Use that.” I did. \r\n Saturday, September 3, I decided to use some of the lumber from the fence next door to make\r\na makeshift signal for the hundreds of helicopter pilots flying above my place. I took the largest\r\nwhitest sheet I could find and laid it on the postage stamp front lawn. I placed four boards of\r\nvarious lengths to form an X. I stood on the sidewalk and took a white towel and twirled it over\r\nmy head when I heard a helicopter coming close at a low altitude. Some would slow down and I\r\ncould see a pilot or his fellow military personnel looking down at me.\r\n Finally on Sunday morning one of the pilots wearing a blue flight suit and a helmet signaled\r\nme with his hand to run to the nearest open field. He flew in the direction of the black Baptist\r\nchurch that sets n the 1900 block of Carondelet Street. Directly in front of that church sets a\r\nvacant lot. The New Orleans Police Department years ago never received promised funds to build a police station there. The church used the lot as is parking lot. I ran with my towel in my\r\nhand, wearing my leather sandals. I ran down Brainerd Street, turned on Josephine and then\r\nturned onto Carondelet, ran one block and stood in the parking lot as the helicopter landed.\r\n A black man and two women approached the helicopter at the same time as I did. They had\r\nbeen walking along Carondelet walking toward downtown. The pilot landed and stepped out of\r\nthe chopper. We had to talk loud so he could hear us. The others asked him a question or two.\r\nI then told him where I lived and I asked him if he could help me leave. He told me to go home\r\nand get my stuff and come back to that same spot and he would pick up all of us. \r\n I returned to the house and filled a soft sided suitcase with clothes and a few other personal\r\nitems, including photos, cds and books. I filled a large vinyl athletic bag with some more books,\r\nclothes and a few sentimental items.\r\n A young man of Asian ethnic background had come to our front gate on Tuesday morning and told Marquis and me as we sat on the front porch that the levees had broken and the water was rising. We thanked him and he walked on back down Jackson toward his place, away from St Charles. I encountered him again that Sunday afternoon after I had secured my apartment, climbed out the kitchen window and trekked back to the church parking lot to await the return of\r\nthe helicopter pilot. He never returned. \r\n When I returned to my apt to pack by bags, I made a point of nailing up the windows in the\r\nhouse, plus the front door. I nailed up the kitchen window from the outside as I stood on top of\r\nthe shelter that housed the water heater. I dropped my two bags and left the hammer under the\r\nbrick pillow on the corner of the porch and the front room for Marquis to use should he return.\r\nI grew hot and tired from the exertion inside the house and outside in the broiling sun. None\r\ntheless I made my way with a bag in each hand back to the parking lot. \r\n I stood in the green lawn of the parking lot and tried to rotate my white tee shirt each time I\r\nsaw a helicopter approaching from any direction at any elevation. None paid any attention to me.\r\nThe young man of Asian descent passed by me as I sat on a stoop in the narrow shade of the mid\r\nday sun, facing the parking lot. He said he was going to the Public Storage facility just up the\r\nstreet to acquire a hand truck. He told me the buses for evacuating people were going to stop \r\nrunning Sunday. He said no buses would arrive to take any more people out after Sunday. He said he and I could walk together down to the Superdome or thereabouts and make an effort to\r\nsecure a bus ride out of town. He said he was going to his place to pack. He said I could wait for\r\nhim and he would return shortly. He left and I waited in the sun that would not stop its broiling\r\nassault on my hair, scalp and exposed forearms. I sat in the shade on the concrete stoop until he\r\nreturned less than an hour later. The time passed slowly and my desperation and anxiety increased as I waited for his return.\r\n He returned and placed my two bags atop his. He walked on the left and I walked on the right\r\nas we pulled the hand truck down an abandoned Carondelet Street toward Lee Circle and beyond.\r\nI realized once again how much the hot sun can debilitate a person and cause one to lose strength quickly in the humidity. My bags fell off repeatedly and I rescued them and replaced them atop the stack. We had to dodge various puddles of water in the gutters on either side of the street. The\r\nwater had filmed over in some spots and turned yellow with growth of God knows what organisms and chemicals. The dark water, either black or brown, gave off a stench like a lawyer. \r\n We finally reached Poydras Street, turned left and headed toward the Superdome. We arrived\r\nat the intersection of Poydras and Loyola Avenue, in sight of the Superdome. We had to stop \r\nbecause the water stood in the street a few feet beyond the intersection toward the Superdome.\r\n A line of privately owned tour buses stood in a long line on the far side of Poydras, on the side\r\nnearest downtown. We stopped and set the handtruck upright. I spotted a tall, handsome and\r\ncharismatic blonde man wearing a dark blue police tee shirt with the logo of the Ashwaubenon\r\nWisconsin Public Safety printed on it. He said his name was Jodi Crocker, a lieutenant with the\r\nAshwaubenon police department. He said Ashwaubenon was a suburb of Green Bay. I asked him where we could catch a bus to ride out of town. He said the bus next to us was leaving about four pm. We thanked him for the information. I hugged him around his chest. I felt a great sense of relief. I shed some tears of relief and some of sorrow. I told him I had bronchitis and I needed to go somewhere to escape the heat. He said I could ride the bus we stood next to. The driver of the bus stepped outside and offered to assist us with putting our bags under the bus in the luggage compartment. They offered us some bottled water and or Gatorade.\r\n They asked us where we wanted to do. My companion said he needed to reach Memphis,\r\nTennessee and then catch a bus east to Atlanta, where his mother planned to undergo surgery in\r\na few days. I told them I wanted them to let me off in Jackson Mississippi so I could catch a bus\r\nto southeast Alabama. They said we could ride with them and they would let us off where we\r\nwanted to go. Two men, one with a television camera and the other with a microphone attached by a long wire to the camera, interviewed me and my companion as we stood in the sun by the bus. He asked about my health and I told him I was tired and anxious but felt better now that we\r\nhad finally arrived at a place where somebody could offer us a ride out of town. \r\n We walked up into the bus and the men inside greeted us. Two of them wore nine millimeter\r\nweapons on their belt but they were dressed in civilian clothes. They said they were police\r\nofficers who had volunteered to come down from Wisconsin to offer help in whatever capacity\r\nthey could. Another man on that same bus was a reporter from a local daily newspaper in the\r\narea around Green Bay, Wisconsin. Two other men on the bus were emergency medical technicians who said they had also volunteered. \r\n The blonde policeman who I had first approached and began asking questions filled me in on\r\nthe group he came down with. One of the group was Jeff Gleason, a member of the police department of Kaukauna, Wisconsin, which is near Green Bay. Another officer from that same\r\ncity, John Nejedlo, was riding that bus with us. The Kaukauna police chief, John Manion, had\r\ncome down in that same bus. Other officers I talked with included Lance Steidl and Darius Pars\r\nof the Fox Valley Metropolitan Police of Little Chute, Wisconsin. \r\n Others officers and medics had ridden down in three other buses in a convoy from Wisconsin. \r\nSome of them said they had called Mayor Ray Nagin’s office and offered help. They came down\r\npost haste and by the time they arrived they had not re-established contact with anyone in New\r\nOrleans. They arrived not knowing what to expect, where to go, who to contact or any other data. My fellow evacuee and I sat in the air conditioned bus for a hour or so and chatted with the\r\nmen inside.\r\n An elderly man who sat in the driver’s seat, I later learned, had recently sold the bus company\r\nand retired. Another elderly gentleman had come down with him to act as second driver. He owned two of the buses and another company owned the other two that followed our lead bus. \r\nEach bus carried two drivers, two medics and two police officers, all volunteers who had taken\r\ntime off from their own work to offer what aid they could. The reporter had come along as well.\r\nHe interviewed my companion first and then talked to me. We gave him a background of what\r\nhad happened before they arrived. He asked about local conditions.\r\n My companion told him he had gone to the Superdome on Monday and had stayed for a day or two. He said he had seen the body of black man who had jumped from the second level of\r\nthe Superdome to the concrete floor below. He said the man received news that the flood had\r\ndestroyed his house and he committed suicide.\r\n He returned to his apartment in our neighborhood after he made good his escape, he said. He said he was a chef. His mother was Swedish and his father was Chinese, he said. He had been working in a restaurant in downtown New Orleans. \r\n We sat in the air-conditioned bus for almost two hours and watched the activity of the civilians and military and law enforcement officials milling about like disoriented cattle in a\r\nconcrete and asphalt pasture. Some of the men on the bus mentioned the lack of organization and\r\nthe general air of chaos that pervaded every move of every person we saw around us. The bus\r\nfaced the Superdome as it set in the intersection of Poydras St and Loyola Ave. We could see the\r\nwater had stopped a few feet short of the intersection. The waters had receded considerably and\r\nstood only about ankle keep. The water stopped on Poydras St a few feet short of the intersection.\r\nCity police cars and Louisiana State Troopers cars set parked on the median on Loyola Ave and\r\nalong Poydras. We saw policemen in blue, state troopers in their tight blue outfits with ties and\r\nsome with their top button buttoned in the summer heat. We saw National Guard troops riding\r\nin their deuce and a half flatbed trucks with the wooden sides. We saw Army troops of the 82d\r\nAirborne ride by in their deuce and a half trucks. \r\n We could see some officers of the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries in their\r\ntwo tone brown uniforms. On Saturday I had seen a convoy of white pickup trucks drive by my\r\nhouse, with a green aluminum fishing boat and motor on a trailer behind every one of them. The\r\nsign on the door of every truck read Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries. I walked out to the road as they stopped and asked one of the riders where they were headed. He said “We\r\nare going just a few blocks from here on Claiborne Avenue to search for bodies.” \r\n I sat in the air conditioned bus relieved to know somebody had finally provided me a means of\r\nescape. Every move by every person in the sun drenched streets around me convinced me that \r\nall of these law enforcement officials from local, state and federal agencies had no leadership,\r\nno coordination, no chain of command, no plan, no resources, no orders, no standard operating\r\nprocedures. The look on the faces of the soldiers carrying automatic weapons and dressed in their\r\nlong sleeved desert camouflage fatigues indicated to me they did not know what to do any more\r\nthan I did. The man-made disaster of a flooded city had overwhelmed everyone from Bush to\r\nBlanco to Nagin and everybody under their jurisdictions. \r\n Had there been no breached levees and no floodwaters, these people, all of them public servants, civilian and military would not have assembled in such large numbers, all of them overwhelmed by the magnitude of a man-made disaster. The hurricane did not devastate NO. The\r\nbreached levees did. \r\n About 4 pm, our bus driver made a u turn and, with the other three buses from Wisconsin\r\nfollowing him, we headed to the Louis Armstrong Airport. The driver had received directions from a police officer who stood in the steps of the bus. I quickly told him I would direct him to\r\nthe airport. The driver headed down Claiborne Avenue and turned onto Carrollton Ave. He then \r\nturned onto Earhart Blvd. He exited Earhart and crossed over and turned onto Airline Drive. \r\nI directed the driver where and when to make each exit and each turn.\r\n As we rode toward the airport, I could see damaged houses and businesses. A two story storage facility featured the front walls blown away by wind. Clothes and other personal and\r\nhousehold items lay exposed to the hot sun. The waters had receded, but we could see where the\r\nfloodwaters had deposited sand and silt and dead leaves in the gutters and on the grassed shoulders of the highway. \r\n We reached the airport and the drivers parked. We saw dozens of helicopters still bringing \r\npeople rescued from various places and landing on the tarmac where the planes normally taxied\r\nin to disgorge passengers. We stayed a few minutes while the drivers consulted with police officers and military personnel. The drivers went to the airport seeking anyone who wanted a ride\r\nnorth out of the city. Nobody boarded any of the buses in our convoy. We then headed north on\r\nI-10 and exited north to Hammond. \r\n As we rode north on I-55, we saw dozens and dozens of white utility trucks from the various\r\npower companies that had driven down from various states. We saw dozens of civilian vehicles\r\ntrying to get past the military checkpoints so the drivers and their passengers could return to\r\nNew Orleans and their local neighborhood to check on their homes and retrieve some of their belongings. I thought about the thousands of gallons of gasoline these cars burned as they sat for\r\nhours and hours waiting for the military personnel on the driver’s side to check IDs and driver’s\r\nlicense. I wondered about the questions these people asked and the stories they told these military\r\npersonnel about where they needed to go and what they needed to do. \r\n We rode north to McComb, Mississippi and pulled in to the parking lot of a Golden Corral restaurant. The young lady at the door told us it was close to seven pm, and they closed at seven. Nonetheless, she opened the door and invited us all to come on in. We did not have to tell her where we had just come from. The sun setting low in the west flooded the walls of the sand\r\ncolored brick building with its large plate glass windows. \r\n We lined up to go through the buffet line. I spotted chicken and dumplings. I filled half my\r\nplate with that one entree. All of the other people on our bus and the other three attracted plenty\r\nof attention from the locals, restaurant employees, and from other evacuees who had arrived in private vehicles. The restaurant had very few empty tables even this close to closing time. \r\n I sat with one of the police officers and asked him why he and his fellow officers came to help us. He said all of them came down voluntarily. They had to take time off from their paying jobs\r\nto help in whatever ways they could. He said every one of the members of his volunteer team he\r\ntalked to said they genuinely and sincerely wanted to help, after they had seen the extent of the\r\ndevastation, desperation and despair on tv news broadcasts. He said many of them needed to\r\nreturn quickly to their homes and families in order to continue cash flow and keep their jobs.\r\n Some of the volunteers in our group paid the tab for me and my fellow evacuee. We walked\r\noutside to the buses and chatted briefly. Lt Jodi Crocker gave me a $20 bill. I thanked him and\r\ntried hard not to break into tears. He asked me to contact him later and tell him how I was doing. \r\nThe drivers and other team members held a conference in the parking lot. They agreed all of the\r\nbuses but one would head to Houston and then Dallas Texas to see if they could pick up some\r\nevacuees who wanted to go north with them. They had earlier agreed that they could not head\r\nnorth with empty buses due to the possible public outcry regarding their inability to find and\r\nrescue anybody who needed a ride out of the disaster zone. All of them agreed they had to reach\r\nhome and go back to work as soon as possible. \r\n We all boarded the buses and headed north to Jackson, Mississippi. I asked our driver to let me off at a gasoline station. Darkness had fallen. The time approached 9 pm. I asked one of the\r\nyoung ladies who worked as one of the team of clerks where I could find a mission or a Red Cross office in town. I had no luck contacting any place to go. I talked with a man who said he\r\nhad just driven in from Atlanta and he was tired. I asked him if he could tell me where the local\r\nbus station was or if he could give me a ride or knew someone who could. He hesitated at first,\r\nsaying he was tired from his long ride. \r\n A few minutes later he came back to me and said he would give me a ride. I piled my two bags in the back and crawled in with them. He and his wife drove to the bus station. When I \r\nstepped out on the ground and removed my bags, he gave me $40. I had not asked him for it. By\r\nthe time I walked inside the terminal and counted my money, I found I had enough to buy a bus\r\nticket from Jackson Miss to Montgomery Alabama. I wanted to cry at the thought of the generosity of these two strangers - the policeman from Wisconsin and now this total stranger from Jackson- who volunteered to give me money without my asking for it. \r\n I purchased my ticket and sat down in the terminal to wait for the next available bus heading\r\nto Birmingham. Two buses came through and quickly filled with people who had arrived earlier.\r\nI had to wait until about 3 am until a bus finally arrived with enough seats to allow me and some\r\nof my fellow evacuees to board. We boarded, headed northeast and arrived in Birmingham at 6\r\nam Monday morning, Labor Day. We changed buses and headed south to Montgomery. We arrived in Montgomery about 10 am. I called my nephew, Drew Brooks, who lives and works in\r\nMontgomery. He brought me $100 that his mother, my sister, Connie Douras, had telegraphed to\r\nhim from her home in Price, Utah. We hugged and then chatted briefly. He had to go back to work at a bank. I thanked him for his concern and the cash. \r\n We rode south to Dothan, Alabama and arrived shortly after 1 pm. I called Amy Pollard, whom I had called during my entrapment and stranding in New Orleans and talked with on the air on WTVY FM 95. After a brief wait in the bus terminal, I saw a van arrive. A young man with black hair stepped out of the truck and headed toward me as I stood next to the door of the\r\nterminal. He said, “My name is Ron Pollard.” I said, “I know who you are. You are Jimmy Pollard’s son and Jim Tom Pollard’s grandson. I went to elementary school at Oak Grove with\r\nyour daddy and with your Aunts Jo Ann and Lois Pollard.” Behind him walked Amy, his wife, and “Big” Mike Casey, who is Amy’s on-air partner for their morning show from 6 to 10 am on WTVY FM 95, a high powered country station. Barry Michaels, one of their producers, accompanied them. I hugged Amy and shook hands with Big Mike and Barry and thanked them. \r\n We piled into the van and Amy asked me where I wanted to go eat. I asked them if they could go to the Long John Silver’s seafood place on the Ross Clark Circle across from Northside Mall.\r\nWe soon arrived and when we walked in I smelled the familiar odors of frying fish and the \r\nmalt vinegar that sets on every table. I thanked all of them profusely and they asked me questions\r\nabout what I had seen and done in the past week. We ate and headed out Highway 84. I asked\r\nRon to ride down Geneva County Road 41. We rode past Wesley Chapel Methodist Church. I\r\npointed out to them the graves of my mother and father, Jim Frank and Bina Barnes Martin.\r\n They let me off in Geneva, Alabama, at the home of one of my mother’s first cousins, Harold\r\n“Dock” Barnes and his wife, Anna Ree Barnes. They are both retired. I thanked Amy and the others and told them we would keep in touch. \r\n I have, to my regret and sorrow, learned what Louis Armstrong meant when he wrote: “Do\r\nyou know what it means to miss New Orleans?” The US Army Corps of Engineers and the\r\npoliticians of Louisiana left me no choice but to leave behind the city and people I loved. My heart will never leave New Orleans. I loved the idiodicity of it all. \r\nMay 24 2006\r\nAnyone who wishes to contact me can call, write or e-mail me at jimfrankmartin@excite.com\r\nJim Martin POB 101 702 White St Geneva Alabama 36340 334-684-2622