Remembering Katrina, with an eye toward the future

Anyone of a certain age along the central Gulf Coast knows the fateful date Aug. 29, 2005, when Hurricane Katrina slammed into Louisiana and Mississippi, killing almost 1,400 people, causing $125 billion in damages, destroying more than 250 historic structures that had survived countless previous storms, and challenging long-held assumptions about reliance on the federal government to come to the aid of a besieged public.

Coastal Louisiana and Mississippi took the brunt of the storm, which pushed a surge of more than 27 feet — the highest in recorded U.S. history, to date — as far as 12 miles inland. In Mississippi alone, an estimated 65,000 houses were damaged or destroyed, 238 people died and 67 were listed as missing. All 82 counties were declared disaster areas. The death toll was far higher in neighboring New Orleans. Owing to Katrina’s unprecedented intensity, the name was later retired from the hurricane roster.

The federal government’s notoriously inadequate response to Katrina led to the resignation of FEMA director Michael Brown, who had made a series of profoundly bad decisions exacerbated by problems brought on by agency funding cuts under the administration of President George W. Bush — the latter a scenario now being repeated under the Trump administration, with the president having threatened to phase out the disaster aid agency altogether.

In the two decades since Katrina hit, development in vulnerable areas continues unabated, and even as the administration dismisses the risks of ongoing climate change, hurricanes are becoming larger, more frequent and more intense, and sea levels that fuel catastrophic storm surges are rising. In all likelihood, Katrina will eventually lose its benchmark status to an even more intense storm, as did the previous record holder, Hurricane Camille, which struck the Mississippi Gulf Coast in 1969.

Katrina received intensive global media coverage, during and after, by outlets from the New York Times down to the Picayune Item. Among those legions of journalists, I covered it for two comparatively obscure publications, the magazine Preservation (published by the National Trust for Historic Preservation) and Lost, a now defunct literary magazine. I also revisited the storm on its 10^th anniversary for The Atlantic. Like many others, I observed the catastrophe in real time, then in historical hindsight, and now, with an eye to what it might portend.

Arriving a week after Katrina hit, I visited communities from Biloxi to Bay St. Louis, at a time when bodies were still turning up on the beaches. Most residents had to fend for themselves in the early days — I slept on a sodden mattress in someone’s yard, and the media was then primarily focused on nearby New Orleans, where the majority of the fatalities occurred due to flooding caused by breeches in protective levees. My own house, 150 or so miles inland, endured 100 mph winds that toppled trees, and we still had no electricity, phone connection or water service. Gasoline and food were in extremely short supply. The reach of Katrina was astounding, from the beaches, marshes and bayous to New Orleans and inland as far as Jackson. This changed the way we viewed our reliance on established infrastructure and the assistance of government agencies. One storm had essentially thrust us into a temporary, modern Dark Age, something that was not easily forgotten.

Yet as natural disasters grow more frequent and intense, the public has suffered a kind of battle fatigue, to the point that many choose to ignore dangerous trends unless they are personally caught in the line of fire — which, sooner or later, most everyone will be. Meanwhile, sea levels in the Gulf of Mexico are rising at one of the fastest rates in the world — three times the global average, according to recent scientific reports.

As we approach the 20^th anniversary of Katrina’s landfall, The Mississippi Independent is asking readers to submit their recollections, both during and after the storm, including their interactions with local, state and federal government agencies, as well as their efforts to adapt to increasing risks and their ideas about the best way forward into a uncertain climatic future. This feedback will help guide our coverage of the anniversary on Aug. 29, 2025.

Comments can be included in posted responses to this article or submitted here. Please provide contact information if you are available for a more detailed conversation.

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Image: Bay St. Louis, Mississippi historic district, post-Katrina (Alan Huffman)