The Great Deluge: Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans, and the Mississippi Gulf Coast

Unlike the Marines, who are given macho monikers like “jarheads,” the Coast Guard had long been denigrated in military circles as fey “puddle jumpers.” But just as 9/11 brought a newfound respect to firemen, Katrina did the same for the reputation of the Coast Guard. At the peak of rescue operations they had 62 aircraft, 30 cutters, and 111 small boats stepping up in rescue and recovery operations. They did it all one person at a time.

Salt Lake City has a monument to the seagulls, which in 1848 swooped down from the sky to devour a swarm of locusts, thereby saving Utah crops. They were known affectionately as the “Mormon Air Force.” Someday New Orleans should likewise honor the dragonfly. With their large multifaceted eyes, two pairs of strong transparent wings, and outstretched bodies, dragonflies frighten most people. On Tuesday dragonflies blanketed New Orleans, hovering just inches above the smelly floodwater, eating every mosquito in sight.

History will remember the Superdome debacle—caused by the dearth of evacuation buses—as “Nagin’s Folly,” mayoral incompetence of the first order.

John McPhee’s 1989 book The Control of Nature, for

A crooked peace officer is just a damned abomination,” McCarthy wrote. “That’s all you can say about it. He’s ten times worse than the criminal.”48