Katrina Coverage

As previously discussed, Gretna Police "trapped survivors in New Orleans". That post contains the following from UPI:

[Chief of the City of Gretna Police Department Arthur Lawson] said that once the storm itself had passed Monday, police from Gretna City, Jefferson Parrish and the Louisiana State Crescent City Connection Police Department closed to foot traffic the three access points to the bridge closest to the West Bank of the river…

What the UPI refers to as the "Crescent City Connection Police Department" appears to be actually be the policing arm of the "Crescent City Connection Division". That latter is a division of the Louisiana State Department of Transportion and Development, a state agency.

It's bad enough if a small-town cop did this, but… is the state of Louisiana responsible for trapping these survivors in New Orleans?

For another data point, this 8/29/05 press release from the Louisiana State Police says:

State Police has received updates from parish and local emergency preparedness centers across the southeast region by Hurricane Katrina. The majority of the calls speak to the same issues such as; flooding, road closures, and power outages. Jefferson Parish (east bank and west bank), St. Tammany Parish, and Orleans Parish are still experiencing high winds (35 – 40 mph) and creating a dangerous situation if you are on an overpass or bridge. For that reason State Police is still encouraging everyone to stay where they are and not to attempt to re-enter the Greater New Orleans area until emergency officials have given the all clear…

Roads currently closed by State Police include:

* Jefferson Parish has ordered all roads closed
* LA 1 south of the Leeville Bridge is closed.
* I-10 eastbound into Mississippi is closed.
* US 61 at the St. Charles / Kenner Line is closed.
* Causeway Bridge is closed.
* Crescent City Connection is closed.
* LA 632 in St. Charles parish is not passable.
* US 61 in St. Charles Parish is closed due to the weather.
* The Belle Chase Tunnel is closed due to flooding.
* I-12 at Albany is closed due to down power lines across the Interstate…

Also see "Building communism under the overpass".

This entry was posted on Friday, September 9th, 2005 at 10:58 pm. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.