open for refugees as gunfire and looting broke out Thursday, September 1, in flood stricken New Orleans, where Hurricane Katrina killed likely thousands of residents.
Rescue workers had difficulties to reach the hot and stinking Superdome indoor stadium where up to 25,000 people waited to be brought to higher and safer ground because anger and unrest mounted across New Orleans, reporters said.
National Guardsmen in armored vehicles reportedly poured in to help restore order across the increasingly lawless and desperate city. "We are out here like pure animals. We don’t have help," the Rev. Issac Clark, 68, told the Associated Press (AP) news agency outside the New Orleans Convention Center. Corpses there lay in the open and evacuees complained that they were dropped off and given nothing, AP reported.
FATS DOMINO MISSING
Among the many missing was 77-year old Rhythm and Blues legend Fats Domino who planned to stay at his New Orleans house with his wife, Rosemary, and their daughter, his longtime agent, Al Embry told AP.
New Orleans Mayor C. Ray Nagin predicted that "at minimum, hundreds" and "most likely thousands" of city residents lay in underwater graves. "We know there is a significant number of dead bodies in the water," he told reporters.
Adding to concern was that "water continues to rise in New Orleans" in the aftermath of Monday’s hurricane, making it difficult for churches in the region to open their doors for refugees, said the Assemblies of God (AG) USA in a statement to BosNewsLife News center.
CHURCHES UNDER WATER
"Early reports indicate [our] churches in [the states of] Louisiana and Mississippi are under water. We are awaiting word of Assemblies of God church status in many areas including Alabama. Unfortunately, communication lines are down and it is not easy to assess the total damage at this time," the group added.
As many as 90 percent of all homes in New Orleans were under water, officials said. "The campground of the Louisiana District is housing some 400 Assemblies of God people stranded from the hurricane," the AG USA explained.
Flooding also added to desperation in other states, Christian aid workers said. At First Baptist Church in Pascagoula, Mississippi, church members hosting the volunteers reportedly requested security from the National Guard, as people stormed the church, Baptist Press (BP) reported.
NO ICE AND FOOD
"People are walking into the church wanting water and ice and food. We don’t have any of it yet, BP quoted Dennis Ray Smith, First Baptist’s associate pastor, as saying. "We’ve asked them to be patient, but we’ve had to lock the doors because we found people going through the volunteers’ belongings, and they’re just storming the church," he reportedly said.
"I understand how they feel. It makes me sick to my stomach to look in my house. [But] if they could just get a jug of water and a bag of ice and a meal, they’d have hope," Smith added.
However a BP reporter said that hope is hard to come by at least one man who drove to the church in a borrowed pickup truck looking for water and ice for his family. When a volunteer told him it could be hours or even another day before any water and ice would be available, he began to cry. She reportedly told him volunteers could help clean up his house.
"I don’t have a house left," he said, apparently wiping tears from his face. "The water went to the attic. I lost everything I’ve ever had." Christian organizations, including Southern Baptists, Operation Blessing and The Salvation Army are reportedly trying to distribute hundreds of thousands of meals and water supplies every a day to increasingly thirsty and hungry people. (With BosNewsLife News Center, BosNewsLife Research and reports from the United States).
