Hurricane Katrina

Katrina pummeled huge parts of Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama, but the desperation was most concentrated in New Orleans. Before the storm, the city’s population was mostly black moreover, nearly 30 percent of its people lived in poverty.

The tropical depression that became Hurricane Katrina formed over the Bahamas on August 23, 2005, and meteorologists were soon able to warn people in the Gulf Coast states that a major storm was on its way. By August 28, evacuations were underway across the region.

When the storm made landfall, it had a Category 3 rating. It brought sustained winds of 100–140 miles per hour–and stretched some 400 miles across. The storm itself did a great deal of damage, but its aftermath was horrible. Levee breaches led to massive flooding, and many people charged that the federal government was slow to meet the needs of the people affected by the storm.

The Storm

Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans early in the morning on Monday, August 29, it had already been raining heavily for hours. When the storm surge arrived, it overwhelmed many of the city’s unstable levees and drainage canals. People had to scramble to attics and rooftops for safety. Eventually, nearly 80 percent of the city was under some quantity of water.

Storm/Flooding

Hurricane Katrina

Before The Storm