A woman cries as she waits with other flood
victims at the Convention Center in New Orleans,
Thursday, Sept. 1, 2005.
Officials called for a mandatory evacuation
of the city, but many residents remained in
the city and had to be rescued from flooded
homes and hotels and remain in the city awaiting
a way out.
On August 29, Hurricane Katrina swamped
New Orleans, a city built below sea level, sustained
by a complex system of dams and whose buffer
against storm surges, the wetlands of the Mississippi
Delta, had been eroded by reckless development.
Thousands are believed to be dead.
