Devastation: New Orleans almost entirely flooded.

The governor of Louisiana today called for a complete evacuation of the city of New Orleans, which was hit hard by the winds, rain and storm surge of Hurricane Katrina. As of last night, 80% of the city was flooded, covering streets and building foundations and in some spots reaching 20 feet deep. The National Guard lost the battle last night to rebuild a damaged levee that holds back Lake Pontchartrain next to the city, but the lake's levels, elevated from the storm surge, are receding back into the ocean, and the water in the city has essentially stopped rising.


The mayor estimated the death toll for the city to be in the hundreds if not thousands.

23,000 residents are stranded in the Superdome, where the water is expected to soon flood both the lower levels and the generators, cutting off power and forcing occupants to higher levels. Authorities are uncertain how to evacuate so many people, but have a temporary location for them: the vacant Houston Astrodome.

Problems will remain

The floodwaters are not expected to rise, but the city's problems are far from over. Current estimates predict that it will be four weeks before the flooding is pumped out of the city. The powerful pumps that removed rainwater from the city are underwater or otherwise not operating.


New Orleans was built in a low area, with the Mississippi River on one side and the Lake Pontchartrain on the other, and is shaped like a bowl. This bowl has partially filled with water that is contains snakes and alligators, a shark, bodies of animals and humans, and toxic chemicals from many nearby industrial sites. One estimate predicts that it will be four months before the city is again habitable. This for a city of almost half a million residents, and another 850,000 in the surrounding metropolitan area who have lost the economic and logistic support of the city.

The situation could have been worse. The hurricane's center, which earlier appeared to be on a direct track toward the city, missed New Orleans by 10 to 15 miles. Katrina also weakened from a Category 5 to Category 4 before it made landfall. These providences kept Katrina from doing the full damage predicted by the National Weather Service:

AT LEAST ONE HALF OF WELL CONSTRUCTED HOMES WILL HAVE ROOF AND WALL FAILURE...
THE MAJORITY OF INDUSTRIAL BUILDINGS WILL BECOME NON FUNCTIONAL...
[A FEW] HIGH RISE OFFICE AND APARTMENT BUILDINGS WILL SWAY... TO THE POINT OF COLLAPSE.

Disaster was predicted years ago

The potential for disaster has been predicted for several years.

Worries began as early as 1969, when the powerful Hurricane Camille came within 100 miles of the city. 1998's Hurricane Georges and 2004's Hurricane Ivan had a chance to hit the city, but made landfall elsewhere.

The June 2005 FX miniseries Oil Storm described a series of events causing massive oil shortages in the US. These included the massive "Hurricane Julia" hitting New Orleans, with many residents taking refuge in the Superdome, as happened this week only two months later.

The risk of a hurricane causing massive damage to the city has been well reported in recent articles in American Radio Works, Natural Hazards Observer, and Popular Mechanics.

Mississippi received brunt of storm

The center of the hurricane made landfall in Mississippi, where a 30 foot storm surge destroyed an estimated 90% of the buildings along the Biloxi-Gulfport coastline. One third of the state is out of power. Two major bridges, and major piers and casinos were destroyed. Thousands of National Guard members are attempting to open roads, severely damaged by floodwaters and debris, to coastal Mississippi. An apartment complex has collapsed, trapping some residents. The state's death toll is expected to reach several hundred.

Sources:

Wikinews:
Louisiana locked down; New Orleans could become a "toxic soup"
Wikipedia: Hurricane Katrina
Effect of Hurricane Katrina on New Orleans
List of demolished structures in Biloxi, MS

Commercial online news:
Mercury News
CNN

Google News items on Hurricane Katrina

Followup: Maria Full of Grace, and Red Eye

Dave asked:

Out of curiosity, what exactly made Maria Full of Grace such a good movie?... I thought that the point of view from the young girl who wanted to make money was done excellently. However, the movie moved slowly and ended anti-climatically in my humble opinion. Although it was more intense in a realistic manner than the overdone action/comedy/horror/ poo poo that has been released as of late.

Maria told the story of a real, everyday person among everyday people. Even the drug dealers were human; their lives, like everyone else's, made up of events and relationships that were interesting even though they weren't unusual. For each person in the film, there are thousands of similar characters in the real world.

(spoiler warning)

The film ended on a high note, with Maria starting a new life. An everyday life, but one full of hope.

For other reasons to like it, the film gave a good view of the drug trade from the mule's perspective. The people in the film were (all but two) Hispanic. The movie gave a comparison between life in Columbia and the US, and calls for one between the life of immigrants to the US, and our lives as citizens from birth. In particular, Maria herself shows an illegal immigrant's perspective as someone working for a better life for herself and her baby.

(end spoiler)

I was disappointed that the story gave virtually no notice of religion's place in the lives of its characters, since it did chronicle all of the other important everyday circumstances.

Overall, it was memorable, but I admit not especially life-changing. It was more encouraging and much deeper than most Chicken Soup for the Soul stories. Not entertainment as it is generally considered, just a good story.

Good point about being intense in a realistic manner. Quality stories about an ordinary situation can be at least as interesting, and have a sort of intensity at least almost as good as a save-the-world scenario. You get a bit of that in Red Eye, too.

Another review: Red Eye was pretty decent. The story and characters could exist in real life, though not quite as much as in Maria. The ending to Red Eye had a lot of action, yet it fit the plot almost perfectly.

This movie is a "suspense thriller." I suspect that men and women will react quite a bit differently to the situation that provokes the thrills. The main character is a young woman, with whom I could sympathize but not really empathize. Most women will probably feel a much stronger bond with Lisa, at least as much empathy as sympathy. Their reactions may be closer to Lisa's herself: fear and hope that she escape; men, seeing the event as if from the outside, may have more anger in place of fear, and a desire to intervene, along with hope to see Lisa escape. This is, of course, a generalization and a made-up theory – could anyone comment? Comparisons of Red Eye to Hitchcock are also welcome.. I don't know Hitchcock well enough to comment.

Good movies versus Bad: Producers get a clue

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The New York Times is reporting that movie attendance this summer will likely be 11.5% less than it was last summer.

11.5% is a massive amount for a sales industry. Why are sales down? Most Americans know why. Movies this summer were junk, there are other forms of entertainment available, renting is as enjoyable as going out, and renting is far cheaper. $18 for two tickets and several more for snacks is far too much to charge if you want regular spending by a middle-income and low-income demographic.

Read the astounding common-sense insights that studio executives have reached this summer:

Before, "you could still count on enough people to come whether you failed at entertaining them or not, out of habit, or boredom, or a desire to get out of the house. You had a little bit of backstop." - Robert Shaye, chairman of New Line Cinema.

Some of our movies "should never have been made." - Marc Shmuger, vice chairman of Universal.

"Audiences have gotten smart to the marketing, and they can smell the good ones from the bad ones at a distance." - Michael Lynton, chairman of Sony Pictures Entertainment

"It wasn't like the last crop of summer movies were that much better than this summer... This summer has been as deadening as it has been exciting... People are just beginning to wake up that what used to pass as summer excitement isn't that exciting, or that entertaining. This is vividly clear in terms of the other choices that consumers have." - Mr. Shmuger

Not only are they seeing the light, some are talking about correcting the problem:

(We will focus on making) "only movies we hope will be really good." - Mr. Lynton

If you're looking for a truly good new movie, go out and rent Maria Full of Grace. It was too good to be strongly marketed or widely released. (Actually, it wasn't widely released because it is in Spanish, with optional English subtitles). And stay away from the worst movies of all: senseless cookie-cutter comedies. Because,

"Rebound wasn't worth the dollar I spent for it" - my brother Caleb and friend Matt.

A defense of my last entry.

I knew I'd have to do this, and Ped has now forced my hand. A defense of my picks in the last entry:

Napoleon Dynamite, as Ped said, is "one of the best thought out comedies ever made." That pretty much sums it up. It was supposed to be stupid on some level, and that is its brilliance. So there, Naomi and Rebekkah.

Star Wars III- the acting and dialogue, particularly Portman's, wasn't the best, but I loved the story. I love Star Wars, what can I say? Palpatine's acting was good, and there were some soon-to-be classic lines. My favorite: "So this is how freedom dies - to thunderous applause." Very true.

I almost never buy CDs as a matter of economics, being a broke college almost-grad, and CD rentals were outlawed by congress many years ago at the behest of the music industry, so I get my music from friends and the radio. Still, I think my picks are worthy of a listen.

I really have to defend Good Charlotte. Ped, have you listened to the whole album, or just their singles? The album not only is a unified piece of art, unlike most such popular works, but does an excellent job of telling the (true) story of Benji and Joel's father who left a great home for a miserable life of sin, at Christmas when the boys were 15. Yet one of the last songs says, "I'm writing this letter to tell you, it's not okay, but we're okay." Powerful stuff, and it's heart-rending to see how close they get to forgiveness without touching it. To be honest, a dad that stupid and who acted so wrongly, I'd have a hard time forgiving. But they miss him in spite of all.

There are two closely-tied themes in this album: not wanting to be like popular society, and not wanting to be like their dad. Both of the goals are worthy ones, if incomplete by themselves. The album does a good job of showing the bankruptcy of both popular society and Mr. Madden.

Hoobastank is good at least for a limited audience - those whose hearts are sore after a relationship breakup, as mine is. It does a good job of vocalizing some things I felt last year. For the audience, they're good, better than most country out there, anyway. (I'm not anti-country, for the record).

Readers, check out the first picks of each list. They're all amazing.