Two years after Hurricane Katrina devastated coastal areas of Louisiana and Mississippi, residents say much of America has forgotten their plight.
Almost every day Erick Ventura wakes up, he thinks about leaving.
You in?" It's the query posed to anyone who would be in the game, an exhortation rich with resolve and checked guts. It's essentially what New Orleanians with a rebuilder's heart have been asking one another for most of the two years since the greatest natural disaster in U.S. history sent 40 billion gallons of water into their city, rinse-cycled homes and lives, and withdrew to lay bare its work.
The owners of a New Orleans nursing home go on trial for the deaths of 35 nursing home patients who weren't evacuated
With large swaths of the Gulf Coast still in ruins from Hurricane Katrina, rich federal tax breaks designed to spur rebuilding are flowing hundreds of miles inland to investors who are buying up luxury condos
Very late Saturday night, on the ground floor of the reborn Louisiana Superdome, New Orleans Saints' defensive end Will Smith was making a point. Outside Smith's door, the venerable big dome was still rocking in the aftermath of the Saints' 27-24 divisional playoff victory over the Eagles. People were singing and dancing and screaming the millionth chorus of Who Dat? You can insert your own Mardi Gras metaphor.
6 organizations looking for volunteers and support for Katrina-affected areas.
Ruthie Frierson's dining room does not look like the birthplace of a populist rebellion. The room is quiet, insulated from any street noise, with treatments in heavy fabric around the windows.
Attorney General Alberto Gonzales is promising federal help to police battling increasing crime in New Orleans.
September 2005 In the days after Hurricane Katrina, a flooded New Orleans, and many of its residents, lay sweltering in the heat. Photos taken by Paolo Pellegrin for Fortune in September of 2005 show a city almost entirely uninhabitable, with the few dry areas covered with debris, and most of the city under water.
Two years after Hurricane Katrina devastated coastal areas of Louisiana and Mississippi, residents say much of America has forgotten their plight.
Almost every day Erick Ventura wakes up, he thinks about leaving.
You in?" It's the query posed to anyone who would be in the game, an exhortation rich with resolve and checked guts. It's essentially what New Orleanians with a rebuilder's heart have been asking one another for most of the two years since the greatest natural disaster in U.S. history sent 40 billion gallons of water into their city, rinse-cycled homes and lives, and withdrew to lay bare its work.
The owners of a New Orleans nursing home go on trial for the deaths of 35 nursing home patients who weren't evacuated
With large swaths of the Gulf Coast still in ruins from Hurricane Katrina, rich federal tax breaks designed to spur rebuilding are flowing hundreds of miles inland to investors who are buying up luxury condos
Very late Saturday night, on the ground floor of the reborn Louisiana Superdome, New Orleans Saints' defensive end Will Smith was making a point. Outside Smith's door, the venerable big dome was still rocking in the aftermath of the Saints' 27-24 divisional playoff victory over the Eagles. People were singing and dancing and screaming the millionth chorus of Who Dat? You can insert your own Mardi Gras metaphor.
6 organizations looking for volunteers and support for Katrina-affected areas.
Ruthie Frierson's dining room does not look like the birthplace of a populist rebellion. The room is quiet, insulated from any street noise, with treatments in heavy fabric around the windows.
Attorney General Alberto Gonzales is promising federal help to police battling increasing crime in New Orleans.
September 2005 In the days after Hurricane Katrina, a flooded New Orleans, and many of its residents, lay sweltering in the heat. Photos taken by Paolo Pellegrin for Fortune in September of 2005 show a city almost entirely uninhabitable, with the few dry areas covered with debris, and most of the city under water.
In the desperate days after hurricane Katrina struck, a doctor and two nurses at a flooded New Orleans hospital allegedly killed four patients by giving them a lethal drug cocktail, Louisiana's top law enforcement official said Tuesday.
Parts of New Orleans sank rapidly in the three years leading up to Hurricane Katrina, which might have made the already low-lying city even more vulnerable, a new study found.
With the hurricane season just days away, officials in New Orleans and across Louisiana are revising emergency plans, fortifying the levee system and preparing residents for the worst.
In a city struggling to rebuild after Hurricane Katrina, newly re-elected Mayor Ray Nagin urged residents of New Orleans to "start the healing process."
New Orleans officials detailed a new disaster-preparedness plan on Tuesday that depends more on evacuation by bus and train and won't use the Superdome and Convention Center as shelters.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency, which floundered in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, should be abolished and replaced with a new organization, a Senate committee recommended Thursday.
After being roundly criticized in a slew of media, congressional and government reports, the Federal Emergency Management Agency's internal watchdog Friday returned its own verdict on the handling of Hurricane Katrina: The criticism against FEMA is largely deserved.
The former federal emergency director who resigned after the heavily criticized response to Hurricane Katrina admitted Friday that he should have been more forthcoming about problems with the government's response to the storm but faulted the performance of his former boss, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, and called for his resignation.
Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff should be fired for his handling of Hurricane Katrina, former federal emergency management chief Michael Brown said Thursday, accusing Chertoff of lacking disaster management knowledge.
A newly released transcript from a video conference the day Hurricane Katrina struck seems to reinforce arguments that governments at all levels identified the potential dangers from the storm but were under-prepared for the devastation.
Six months after its near death by drowning, the Crescent City is marking its resuscitation with Mardi Gras.
Is it too soon for a city devastated by Hurricane Katrina to hold a party? CNN.com asked readers to share their views. Here is a selection of some responses that said it was too early to hold Mardi Gras following the destruction of Katrina. Some of the responses have been edited.
Michael Jordan, who led the Chicago Bulls to six National Basketball Association championships, will auction off autographed memorabilia to raise money for Katrina relief efforts, according to a published report.
Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff took responsibility at a Senate hearing Wednesday for his department's inadequate response to Hurricane Katrina, which "unnecessarily prolonged" the suffering of people along the Gulf Coast.
A congressional report to be released this week slams the government's response to Hurricane Katrina, calling it a "failure of leadership" that left people stranded when they were most in need.
Senate Democrats investigating FEMA's response to Hurricane Katrina say they have documented nearly 30 instances in which federal and local government officials gave early reports on Aug. 29 that levees had broken and that New Orleans was flooding, including one report at 8:30 a.m. the day of the storm.
An independent study warned of managerial and logistical weaknesses at the Federal Emergency Management Agency months before its heavily criticized response to Hurricane Katrina.
The head of a Louisiana state agency given responsibility for coordinating the evacuation of at-risk populations during emergencies has told Senate investigators that no evacuation plans were in place before Hurricane Katrina struck in August.
Federal emergency officials failed to accept offers of possibly life-saving aid from the Department of Interior immediately after Hurricane Katrina, according to documents obtained by CNN.
The White House is dodging questions about Hurricane Katrina response and has instructed other agencies to join it in fending off investigators, Sen. Joseph Lieberman said on Tuesday. The White House denies the allegations.
James Anthony, who fled Hurricane Katrina like tens of thousands others, is facing a wrenching decision: whether to return home and help rebuild a shattered community or make a new home elsewhere, essentially from scratch.
Natural disasters, terrorism and politics drove the top stories of 2005, according to an unscientific poll of CNN.com readers.
Louisiana officials working to identify the last 170 unknown victims of Hurricane Katrina are getting help from seasoned Bosnian DNA experts.
When it slammed ashore on the Gulf Coast in August, Hurricane Katrina was a strong Category 3 storm, not a Category 4 as initially thought, the National Hurricane Center said Tuesday.
The Internal Revenue Service is scaling back its mileage deduction, which had received an unusual late-year bump when gasoline prices soared following Hurricane Katrina.
Frustrated New Orleans residents appeared before Mayor Ray Nagin Tuesday with complaints about the response to Hurricane Katrina, with two speakers asking why a nation fighting to stabilize Iraq can't resolve a crisis at home.
Police, firefighters, and Coast Guard crews may be the first to come to mind when naming the lifesavers during disasters such as Hurricane Katrina.
A Louisiana congressman says e-mails written by the government's emergency response chief as Hurricane Katrina raged show a lack of concern for the unfolding tragedy and a failure in leadership.
As residents of New Orleans' hardest-hit district lined up for miles to see what was left of their homes Wednesday, one man made a grim discovery.
A south Florida man who claimed he was flying supply and evacuation missions to aid victims of Hurricane Katrina has been arrested and charged in the first federal indictment stemming from a wave of suspected phony Internet solicitations for hurricane relief, federal officials announced Monday.
As the residents of shattered Gulf Coast towns like Biloxi, Miss., and Gretna, La., began returning home or crawling from the wreckage in the days after Hurricane Katrina hit, many found their way ...
HOWARD SCHULTZ
In sometimes heated testimony before a congressional committee Tuesday, former Federal Emergency Management Agency chief Michael Brown blamed Louisiana's leaders for dragging their heels last month as Hurricane Katrina approached the Gulf Coast.
A congressional panel on Tuesday is expected to scrutinize the decision to keep ousted Federal Emergency Management Agency chief Michael Brown on the federal payroll.
(CNN) -- No deaths from Hurricane Rita have been reported in Louisiana or Texas, but early damage assessments are emerging as emergency officials enter affected areas.
As many as 1,000 people who did not follow mandatory evacuation orders in one southwestern Louisiana parish may need to be rescued, an emergency management official said Saturday.
There truly is no rest for the weary on the Gulf Coast, nor for the aid organizations that have been providing life-saving assistance for them over the past month.
As water continued to pour over patched levees in New Orleans, Mayor Ray Nagin late Friday told CNN, "This nightmare just continues for us."
As Category 4 Hurricane Rita headed toward the Gulf Coast, thousands of residents in the greater Houston area jammed highways Thursday only to sit in traffic that moved no faster than a pedestrian's gait.
With President Bush promising massive aid to rebuild the devastated Gulf Coast, investors are eyeing what companies stand to benefit from the rebuilding process.
In a matter of hours, Hurricane Katrina caused billions of dollars in property damage. Yet at a time when survivors are in the greatest need, the task of filing a claim for life insurance can be a daunting one.
President Bush said Tuesday he takes responsibility for the federal government's failures in responding to Hurricane Katrina.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said the people who were stranded in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina are evidence that race and poverty can still come together "in a very ugly way" in parts of the "Old South."
NEW YORK (CNN/Money) - Restrictions on making early 401(k) and IRA withdrawals may be eased for Hurricane Katrina survivors, possibly as early as this week.
Hurricane Katrina wrought untold amounts of damage. But nationally, what is considered to be the largest natural disaster in U.S. history may not devastate or significantly alter companies' hiring plans in the fourth quarter.
White and black Americans view Hurricane Katrina's aftermath in starkly different ways, with more blacks viewing race as a factor in problems with the federal response, according to a CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll released Monday.
In an effort to aid individuals who have become suddenly unemployed due to Hurricane Katrina , the Department of Labor announced the creation of a new job resource on Monday.
President Bush got a firsthand look Monday at two of the areas most damaged by Hurricane Katrina, while the man initially in charge of the federal government's response to the disaster resigned.
President Bush arrived in Louisiana Sunday as the official death toll from Hurricane Katrina climbed past 400 and the search for bodies continued nearly two weeks after the storm hit the Gulf Coast.
Coast Guard Vice Adm. Thad Allen will replace FEMA director Michael Brown as the on-site head of hurricane relief operations in the Gulf Coast, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff announced Friday afternoon.
You've heard several people on our show, including the Rev. Jesse Jackson and others, admonish us not to use the term "refugee" when describing the New Orleans citizens who've had to flee their homes. Jackson and others, including President Bush, have said or implied that term is racially insensitive.
The Internal Revenue Service announced a program Thursday where employees across the country can trade in their sick or vacation days in exchange for cash to help victims of Hurricane Katrina.
Will the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina send the economy into a slowdown or will it lead to higher inflation -- or both?
Weeks before Hurricane Katrina flooded New Orleans, government officials reportedly were organizing a campaign to warn the city's poor that they would need to find their own way out in the event of an evacuation.
Repair crews have patched the ruptured levee along the 17th Street Canal and have begun pumping water from New Orleans, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said Monday.
Even as the Army Corps of Engineers made progress removing water from New Orleans, the city's deputy police chief urged remaining residents Monday to get out because there was no power, drinkable water or food supply.
Defending the U.S. government's response to Hurricane Katrina, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff argued Saturday that government planners did not predict such a disaster ever could occur.
Amid unfathomable loss and deplorable conditions, there was at least one bright moment in the wake of Hurricane Katrina.
The director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency said Thursday those New Orleans residents who chose not to heed warnings to evacuate before Hurricane Katrina bear some responsibility for their fates.
Hurricane storm surges have resulted in limited flooding of the city of New Orleans before. But Hurricane Katrina's winds pushed in a devastating surge of water from the Gulf of Mexico that overwhelmed the city's system of levees built to hold back the surrounding Mississippi River and Lake Pontchartrain.
President Bush sought Thursday to reassure victims of Hurricane Katrina that the federal government is doing its best to send aid to the thousands of displaced and stranded people.
Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco said Thursday she has requested the mobilization of 40,000 National Guard troops to restore order and assist in relief efforts in hurricane-ravaged New Orleans.
President Bush spoke Wednesday at the White House after meeting with his Cabinet about the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. This is a transcript of his remarks:
Victims of Hurricane Katrina will be getting a little help from celebrities.
President Bush sought Thursday to reassure victims of Hurricane Katrina that the federal government was doing its best to send aid to the thousands of displaced and stranded people.
The first of New Orleans' evacuees began arriving in Texas early Thursday as the Gulf Coast began to grasp the magnitude of what President Bush called "one of the worst natural disasters in our nation's history."
As New Orleans authorities worked to plug the breaches in the city's levees, and search and rescue teams headed to devastated areas of the Gulf Coast, President Bush promised a national effort on behalf of Hurricane Katrina victims.
For many of the survivors of Hurricane Katrina, little is left but heartbreak and hardship.
A day after Hurricane Katrina dealt a devastating blow to the Big Easy, New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin on Tuesday night blasted what he called a lack of coordination in relief efforts for setting behind the city's recovery.
New Orleans faced two crises Wednesday that Louisiana's governor called nightmares: stopping rising floodwaters in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and evacuating survivors of the deadly storm.
Hundreds of thousands of people in Gulf Coast states are without homes or power in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, and aid agencies are warning the situation might not improve for weeks, maybe months.
For many of the victims of Hurricane Katrina, nothing is left.
Hurricane Katrina has inflicted more damage to Mississippi's beach towns than Hurricane Camille did, and its death toll is likely to be higher, the state's governor said Tuesday.
U.S. Gulf Coast residents who braved Hurricane Katrina on Tuesday began to face the storm's impact:
Victims of Hurricane Katrina -- some of whom escaped with only their lives -- soon will get help from a massive federal relief effort led by the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the Pentagon.
In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, rescue workers searched for stranded survivors in flooded parts of New Orleans.
National Guard troops moved toward the French Quarter in an effort to stop rising unrest in flood-stricken New Orleans late Tuesday as police reported looting, attempted carjackings and shootings near the city's main shelter.
New Orleans resembled a war zone more than a modern American metropolis Tuesday, as Gulf Coast communities struggled to deal with the devastating aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
Hundreds of thousands of refugees from Hurricane Katrina holed up with friends and family across the South probably have one question foremost on their minds: When can I go home?
Louisiana officials Monday urged the hundreds of thousands of people in the state who fled Hurricane Katrina to stay where they are.
Hurricane Katrina left at least 56 people dead Monday, about 50 of them in one Mississippi county, CNN confirmed, and the toll was expected to climb following one of the most powerful hurricanes to hit the northern Gulf Coast in a half century.
Flooding from Hurricane Katrina's Monday landfall could wreak catastrophe on New Orleans, overwhelming the city's water and sewage systems and leaving survivors in a bowl of toxic soup, a top hurricane expert said.
A solemn New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin ordered mandatory evacuations Sunday as his city faced its worst fear -- the threat of a direct hit from a major hurricane that could swamp the low-lying city.
Hurricane Katrina intensified Sunday to a Category 5 storm as it churned towards the U.S. Gulf Coast with maximum sustained winds of 160 mph.
Hurricane Katrina was packing winds of up to 145 mph early Sunday as it approached the U.S. Gulf Coast, the National Hurricane Center said early Sunday.
Hurricane Katrina lumbered ashore Thursday evening with punishing winds and torrential rain in densely populated southeast Florida, leaving at least two people dead and more than 1 million without electricity.
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