Below is a blog I posted in 2007.
(Some of the links may not still work)
Whenever Sept. 11th rolls around, it now reminds me of slogging around in waist deep briny sewage, in an absolutely silent New Orleans, listening for distant dog barks. I looked at my watch and instead of seeing the time, I noticed the date, 09 11 05. For days, we had been cut off from any of the world outside of the Katrina ravaged areas. So, none of the New York remembrances were filtering to us. After days of being there, it was hard to keep track of what day it was. Suddenly, I realized this day would always have an additional association with tragedy for at least, me. It was the day the animal shelter was busting at the seams and we were told the group of animals we had just taken from their flooded homes had nowhere to go. And the animals we heard crying the distance would not be assisted, and it could be weeks before anyone would be there again...
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On Sept. 9th, 2005, at about 3:00 am, we arrived in ..Gonzalez, Louisiana after a six and a half hour drive from Austin.
You can go to THIS LINK to see more of my photos from NOLA just after Hurricane Katrina
We had a small john boat in tow, still muddy from an earlier unsuccessful clandestine rescue mission into New Orleans.
SIDE STORY: The earlier rescue effort was made by Brandon Darby and Scott Crow to rescue Robert "King" Wilkerson (the one freed member of the Angola 3 ) just a week earlier. King was trapped in his house. About a week and a half later, Brandon went back, on his own. This time his efforts led to finally retrieving King (alive) from his home, which was still flooded with seven feet of flood waters. (I was not involved with King's rescue; I just managed to procure the little boat from Brandon for our own rescue work).
Shortly after that, Brandon and Scott, along with former NO Black Panther Party Member, Malik Rahim , were instrumental in helping form the Common Ground Collective which is still in the lower 9th Ward assisting the people hardest hit by the failed levees.
By the 8th of September (2005), every person in New Orleans who was able and wanted to leave, was gone. We were there for a different type of rescue work. Because we had a boat, the HSUS had asked us to come to the makeshift animal shelter at the fair grounds in Gonzalez, Lousiana (45 minutes west of New Orleans)
During the previous days in Austin we spent our time helping some of the NOLA evacuees who managed to make it to Austin with their pets. Some of the shelters had facilities to house the pets. But after the evacuees had been lied to a million times already, none of them trusted any of the official services. We also went to a local pet store Rivers & Reefs (the best pet store in South Austin), They had made a public announcement we were going there and asked for donations of all sorts. We ended up with truck loads of stuff. We filled up the boat and our car with the contributions. And then we made arrangements to get the overflow to the center in Gonzalez a few days later.
When we arrived there at 3am, we were told there were about 1500 dogs, almost 1000 cats, about 300 horses, and all sorts of other animals. (Within three or four more days, there were over 3000 dogs and about 1500 cats.)
We took a three hour nap and got our orders to convoy into NO and set up a receiving station for the animals being pulled out of the dry houses and streets. We did this for about 10 hours, that day. Our team received, triaged, fed and hydrated about 150 pets that day. At the end of the day, the animals were driven to Gonzalez in a long line of RVs. Our day ended with a debrief at about 2:00am.
On the 10th of Sept., we spent the day setting up a camp at the shelter facility and then worked in the shelter the majority of the day. We also spent a part of the day getting the word out that we had a boat available. After being passed around from agency to agency, we met the swift water rescue teams from the American Humane Association and the Animal Rescue League of Boston, (They had been there for about a week already. This group was also being sponsored, in part, by Animal Planet.
American Humane Association's Katrina headquarters.
Every night there was a debrief. These were typically held at about 1 or 2am.
On Sept. 11th, we went out with swift water rescue teams. We were issued heavy rubber dry-suits with built-in boots and tight rubber gaskets around the wrists and neck. Added to the suits were, bulky life preservers equipped with knives, whistles, walkie-talkies, first-aid equipment, and pockets stuffed with bottled water.
The area of town where my team was deployed was still under water, but quite a bit of the flood waters had receded to a point that we couldn't ride in the boat, otherwise the bottom and small engine would scrap the pavement. So, much of the time, we walked along the side of the boat pushing it through the flooded streets. The water was a waist-deep mixture of any chemical liquid found in any car (anti-freeze, oil, gasoline, transmission and break and power steering fluids, battery acid, etc.), sewage, briny river waters, industrial and household garbage, and many dead animals. This "water" was the only thing some of the stranded animals had to ingest for weeks.
Later that day, we brought in the dogs we had managed to catch, to the afternoon check-in. Earlier, we made plans to go out for one more shift. But then we were given word that various government agencies were plotting to shut down the animal shelter in Gonzalez for "health reasons," and we were not to take anymore animals to the facility. Our group leaders then, managed to convince someone over there, to at least take in the ones we had just rescued. A huge battle ensued over the next day or two over what to do with the animals already in the shelter.
(Sept. 12th) So, while that was going on, the leaders of all the rescue groups came up with a plan to set up "feeding stations." They instructed all the field volunteers to change their mission from rescue to simply sustaining life. The idea was to at least keep as many of the remaining animals alive and in-place as possible, by taking food and water to them, in hopes of a later rescue. We were broken up into small groups of two and three and given different areas of New Orleans to work. Each group was given about 10 square blocks to canvas, per day.
We packed our vehicles to the gills with donated pet food and water. We had to drive up and down the empty muddy streets with the doors open at about 3 mph calling out to unseen animals and listening for barking or waiting to see an animal dart under a house or behind a pile of debris. Many times, we had to break into houses to get aid to the abandon pets. Once an animal was spotted, we would have to get as close as possible and leave what we figured would be about three to five days of food and water. We would do this till dark. On average, a team of two would spot about 90 dogs and cats per day.
Eventually the shelter was able to stay open and slowly phased out over the next months. The setting up of feeding stations went on throughout the rest of 2005 and into 2006.
There is a lot more to tell but, I could never finish even a tenth of what I wish I could tell.
Below are some photos I took in NOLA between the 9th and 13th of September 2005
You can go to THIS LINK to see more of my photos from NOLA just after Hurricane Katrina. In the Flikr photo set, there are more thorough descriptions with the photos.
"Feeding Station" Food and water were left for this homeless dog and others
who were roaming the neighborhood. About September 13th, 2005.
Neighborhood street near Napoleon Ave. at St.Charles.
Just after Katrina about September 13th, 2005.
Alison marking a home where a mother dog was found
in a house with her six puppies.
One of the stalls in the Gonzalez shelter.
Corner of S Roman St and Milan Street. Approx Sept 12, 2005
Returning with three dogs. S Galvez St. About Sept 11th, 2005.
My favorite of the rescued horses.
Prosthetic arm left on a porch. Near the corner of S Roman St. and Milan St. Approx Sept 12, 2005.
This statue was untouched just inches away from a collapsed house.
Stern warning.
Doll seen on a neighborhood found near Napoleon Ave. at St.Charles.
This was Giselle. She was one of my favorite of the rescued dogs.
Her name and owners' phone number were written on her collar.
This was very rare. I called and called for several days but any phone with a 504 area code (even mobiles) wouldn't work. After about four days, she was shipped out of state. Like thousands and thousands of the others, there's no telling what happened to her.
MORE PHOTOS