Thread: Gunfire, Looting, and call for troops.

The people that are stuck in the disaster area are calling for troops. Do we even have enough troops to send left?

Many sources on the major networks are saying that if troops are not deployed by nightfall, they do not think they can even protect people in the health care facilities from the anarchy outside.

Also, reports are that most of the looting is of clothing and jewelry. Not just food.

Sounds like a rough night ahead. Any bets on if the President calls in troops?

How about a Presidential call to conserve gas? Will the big oil man call for Americans to conserve gas like he should have done months ago?

He is coming on at 5pm EST today to speak from the Rose Garden. Why he is addressing us from the Garden instead of his desk is anyones guess.

Let's see if Mr. President is more loyal to his nation or the Gas companies today at 5.

W

I think you can guess what my vote is.

NEW ORLEANS -- Hurricane Katrina probably killed thousands of people in New Orleans, the mayor said Wednesday _ an estimate that, if accurate, would make the storm the nation's deadliest natural disaster since at least the 1906 San Francisco earthquake.

"We know there is a significant number of dead bodies in the water," and other people dead in attics, Mayor Ray Nagin said. Asked how many, he said: "Minimum, hundreds. Most likely, thousands."

The frightening estimate came as Army engineers struggled to plug New Orleans' breached levees with giant sandbags and concrete barriers, while authorities drew up plans to clear out the tens of thousands of people left in the Big Easy and all but abandon the flooded-out city.

There will be a "total evacuation of the city. We have to. The city will not be functional for two or three months," Nagin said.

Most of those storm refugees _ 15,000 to 20,000 people _ were in the Superdome, which had become hot and stuffy, with broken toilets and nowhere for anyone to bathe. "It can no longer operate as a shelter of last resort," the mayor said.

Nagin estimated 50,000 to 100,000 people remained in New Orleans, a city of nearly half a million people. He said 14,000 to 15,000 a day could be evacuated.

The Pentagon, meanwhile, began mounting one of the largest search-and-rescue operations in U.S. history, sending four Navy ships to the Gulf Coast with drinking water and other emergency supplies, along with the hospital ship USNS Comfort, search helicopters and elite SEAL water-rescue teams. American Red Cross workers from across the country converged on the devastated region in the agency's biggest-ever relief operation.

Katrina slammed into the Gulf Coast on Monday just east of New Orleans with howling, 145-mile wind. The death toll has reached at least 110 in Mississippi alone. But the full magnitude of the disaster had been unclear for days; Louisiana has been putting aside the counting of the dead to concentrate on rescuing the living, many of whom were still trapped on rooftops and in attics.

If the mayor's estimate holds true, it would make Katrina the nation's deadliest hurricane since 1900, when a storm in Galveston, Texas, killed between 6,000 and 12,000 people. The death toll in the San Francisco earthquake and the resulting fire has been put at anywhere from about 500 to 6,000.

A full day after the Big Easy thought it had escaped Katrina's full fury, two levees broke and spilled water into the streets Tuesday, swamping an estimated 80 percent of the bowl-shaped, below-sea-level city, inundating miles and miles of homes and rendering much of New Orleans uninhabitable for weeks or months.

"We are looking at 12 to 16 weeks before people can come in," Nagin said on ABC's "Good Morning America, "and the other issue that's concerning me is we have dead bodies in the water. At some point in time the dead bodies are going to start to create a serious disease issue."

With the streets awash and looters brazenly cleaning out stores, authorities planned to move at least 25,000 of the New Orleans' storm refugees to the Houston Astrodome, 350 miles away, in a vast, two-day convoy of some 475 buses.

Gov. Kathleen Blanco said the situation was desperate and there was no choice but to clear out.

"The logistical problems are impossible and we have to evacuate people in shelters," the governor said. "It's becoming untenable. There's no power. It's getting more difficult to get food and water supplies in, just basic essentials."

Around midday, officials with the state and the Army Corps of Engineers said the water levels between the city and Lake Pontchartrain had equalized, and water had stopped rising in New Orleans, and even appeared to be falling, at least in some places. But the danger was far from over.

The Army Corps of Engineers said it planned to use heavy-duty Chinook helicopters to drop 20,000-pound sandbags Wednesday into the 500-foot gap in the failed floodwall. But the agency said it was having trouble getting the sandbags and dozens of 15-foot highway barriers to the site because the city's waterways were blocked by loose barges, boats and large debris.

Officials said they were also looking at a more audacious plan: finding a barge to plug the 500-foot hole.

"The challenge is an engineering nightmare," the governor said on ABC's "Good Morning America."

As the sense of desperation deepened in New Orleans, hundreds of people wandered up and down Interstate 10, pushing shopping carts, laundry racks, anything they could find to carry their belongings. Dozens of fishermen from up to 200 miles away floated in on caravans of boats to pull residents out of flooded neighborhoods.

On some of the few roads that were still passable, people waved at passing cars with empty water jugs, begging for relief. Hundreds of people appeared to have spent the night on a crippled highway.

In one east New Orleans neighborhood, refugees were loaded onto the backs of moving vans like cattle, and in one case emergency workers with a sledgehammer and an ax broke open the back of a mail truck and used it to ferry sick and elderly residents.

Police officers were asking residents to give up any guns they had before they boarded buses and trucks because police desperately needed the firepower: Some officers who had been stranded on the roof of a motel said they were being shot at overnight.

The sweltering city of 480,000 people _ an estimated 80 percent of whom obeyed orders to evacuate as Katrina closed in over the weekend _ had no drinkable water, the electricity could be out for weeks, and looters were ransacking stores around town.

Sections of Interstate 10, the only major freeway leading into New Orleans from the east, lay shattered, dozens of huge slabs of concrete floating in the floodwaters. I-10 is the only route for commercial trucking across southern Louisiana.

In addition to the Houston Astrodome solution, the Federal Emergency Management Agency was considering putting people on cruise ships, in tent cities, mobile home parks, and so-called floating dormitories _ boats the agency uses to house its own employees.

A helicopter view of the devastation over Louisiana and Mississippi revealed people standing on black rooftops, baking in the sunshine while waiting for rescue boats.

"I can only imagine that this is what Hiroshima looked like 60 years ago," said Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour after touring the destruction by air Tuesday.

All day long, rescuers in boats and helicopters plucked bedraggled flood refugees from rooftops and attics. Louisiana Lt. Gov. Mitch Landrieu said 3,000 people have been rescued by boat and air, some placed shivering and wet into helicopter baskets. They were brought by the truckload into shelters, some in wheelchairs and some carrying babies, with stories of survival and of those who didn't make it.

"Oh my God, it was hell," said Kioka Williams, who had to hack through the ceiling of the beauty shop where she worked as floodwaters rose in New Orleans' low-lying Ninth Ward. "We were screaming, hollering, flashing lights. It was complete chaos."

Looting broke out in some New Orleans neighborhoods, prompting authorities to send more than 70 additional officers and an armed personnel carrier into the city. One police officer was shot in the head by a looter but was expected to recover, authorities said.

A giant new Wal-Mart in New Orleans was looted, and the entire gun collection was taken, The Times-Picayune newspaper reported. "There are gangs of armed men in the city moving around the city," said Ebbert, the city's homeland security chief.

The governor acknowledged that looting was a severe problem but said that officials had to focus on survivors. "We don't like looters one bit, but first and foremost is search and rescue," she said.

In Washington, the Bush administration decided to release crude oil from federal petroleum reserves to help refiners whose supply was disrupted by Katrina. The announcement helped push oil prices lower.

___

Associated Press reporters Holbrook Mohr, Mary Foster, Allen G. Breed, Adam Nossiter and Jay Reeves contributed to this report.

Also, reports are that most of the looting is of clothing and jewelry. Not just food.

Looting is a crime of opportunity, not need.

Originally Posted by CountFloyd

Also, reports are that most of the looting is of clothing and jewelry. Not just food.

Looting is a crime of opportunity, not need.

They were also hitting Wal Mart sporting goods for guns.

We need to keep all the victims in our prayers. I can't even imgaine how devasting it must be.

Originally Posted by Charlesoakisland

Originally Posted by CountFloyd

Also, reports are that most of the looting is of clothing and jewelry. Not just food.

Looting is a crime of opportunity, not need.

They were also hitting Wal Mart sporting goods for guns.

Did you see the news footage last night of the two NO uninformed policewomen participating in the looting at Wal-Mart? When questioned by the reporter, the reply was "just doing my job, sir!" The reporter asked if "lifting" shoes was part of the job.

When I heard about the gangs today up on buildings being snipers against the police, I couldn't believe it. I heard they robbed all the gun stores and are very well armed.

It was on the news a little while ago that they were expecting gangs with AK47's to be roaming the streets tonight.

I can't hold GWB responsible for Hurricane Katrina, but anytime I hear about "gangs", I can't help but to not hold him responsible for that. Am I wrong? Please tell me if I am.

We know SERIOUSLY dangerous gangs have entered our country through the easy illegal immigration route, and many, many people have warned us of the potential danger with that. Am I wrong to think that what we are seeing is a result of illegal alien gangs, or not? I don't know the numbers of illegals in these areas, but I can only think that the extremely dangerous gangs who are here illegally only serve to fuel and train those who may be gang members who are citizens. Would that seem logical?
If I'm wrong and illogical, please tell me, because hearing about what's been going on today had me thinking about this a lot.