Some of the more memorable parts:
- At one point, a cameraman is filming the empty streets (it looks like Canal Street to me) and another man walks up to him. The cameraman can be heard excitedly saying the city dodged the bullet as the storm had turned East. The other man shook his head and explained that the levees had failed and water was pouring into the city. The cameraman did not believe him but ran off to investigate. I remember watching TV in the office at the time and some people I work with laughing at the scene of a house on fire in the flood. I was pretty angry at their reaction and was kind of an ass to them. But they deserved it.
- One scene shows a lifelong resident of the Lower 9th returning to her home for the first time. It is heartbreaking to see her reaction to the destruction of her home.
- Someone working for the city explained that, 9 months after Katrina, they had removed 25 times the amount of debris of the World Trade Centers and were barely 2/3 of the way done. I saw the mound of debris from the WTC from a few blocks away. The idea that New Orleans had a pile of debris 40 times as large is mind-boggling.
- Finally, there are two stories of sons losing their mothers -- one died at the Convention Center and one who died in her own home. The Convention Center story was incredible, the man had to leave his mother's dead body by the side of the road (she sat their for a week at least). How can someone be asked to do that? The other was also tragic -- FEMA checked the house once and missed the body, as it was under the refrigerator. The son was just speechless at times, the pain etched on his face, as he explained what happened.
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