Secluded Islands
02-09-2005, 16:47
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http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9156612/
NEW ORLEANS - Four days after Hurricane Katrina blasted through, corpses continued to rot along sidewalks and thousands remained stranded — crying for food, water and a way to evacuate.
By midmorning Friday, despite a constant buzzing of military helicopters overhead, there was still no sign of the relief to the thousands at the city's convention center.
“I’m trying to keep hope alive, but slowly my hope is fading,” said refugee Carl Clark. “Believe it or not, these people are human. Right now they’re crowded like animals. They’re trying to keep their dignity. ... I don’t even know what the Red Cross looks like.”
Raymond Whitfield, 51, watched a National Guard truck drive by the convention center, but like most other official vehicles, it did not stop.
“The National Guard just drives around and around. I know the police, the National Guard, they got generators, so they can sleep and eat,” he said.
“Look at them,” he said of the men inside the truck, “they’re not even sweating.”
“Everybody’s on the edge right now,” said 28-year-old Kenya Green. “Every day, it’s ‘The bus is coming, The bus is coming,’ but still nothing. ... They don’t give us no information.”
City officials have seethed with anger about what they called a slow federal response.
“They don't have a clue what's going on down there,” Mayor Ray Nagin told WWL-AM Thursday night. "Excuse my French everybody in America but I am pissed.”
Emergency relief bill
Bush has called the relief effort the biggest in U.S. history. The House was to convene at noon Friday to send the aid bill to Bush’s desk for his signature. The Senate gave the measure voice-vote approval late Thursday.
But New Orleans officials and stranded residents said the response should have been quicker.
“This is a national disgrace,” New Orleans’ emergency operations chief Terry Ebbert said Thursday. “We can send massive amounts of aid to tsunami victims, but we can’t bail out the city of New Orleans.”
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9156612/
NEW ORLEANS - Four days after Hurricane Katrina blasted through, corpses continued to rot along sidewalks and thousands remained stranded — crying for food, water and a way to evacuate.
By midmorning Friday, despite a constant buzzing of military helicopters overhead, there was still no sign of the relief to the thousands at the city's convention center.
“I’m trying to keep hope alive, but slowly my hope is fading,” said refugee Carl Clark. “Believe it or not, these people are human. Right now they’re crowded like animals. They’re trying to keep their dignity. ... I don’t even know what the Red Cross looks like.”
Raymond Whitfield, 51, watched a National Guard truck drive by the convention center, but like most other official vehicles, it did not stop.
“The National Guard just drives around and around. I know the police, the National Guard, they got generators, so they can sleep and eat,” he said.
“Look at them,” he said of the men inside the truck, “they’re not even sweating.”
“Everybody’s on the edge right now,” said 28-year-old Kenya Green. “Every day, it’s ‘The bus is coming, The bus is coming,’ but still nothing. ... They don’t give us no information.”
City officials have seethed with anger about what they called a slow federal response.
“They don't have a clue what's going on down there,” Mayor Ray Nagin told WWL-AM Thursday night. "Excuse my French everybody in America but I am pissed.”
Emergency relief bill
Bush has called the relief effort the biggest in U.S. history. The House was to convene at noon Friday to send the aid bill to Bush’s desk for his signature. The Senate gave the measure voice-vote approval late Thursday.
But New Orleans officials and stranded residents said the response should have been quicker.
“This is a national disgrace,” New Orleans’ emergency operations chief Terry Ebbert said Thursday. “We can send massive amounts of aid to tsunami victims, but we can’t bail out the city of New Orleans.”