BATON ROUGE, LA. — New Orleans homemaker Vanessa Hoffman clearly remembers the night of HurricaneKatrina’s arrival and when her neighborhood flooded.
TheNew Orleans homemaker and single mother took her two children Mia, 9, andVance, 15, and escaped knee-high water in her 7th Ward home. The 7thWard is a section of downtown New Orleans, situated just south of theMississippi River.
“Youcould hear the surges of water,” said Hoffman. “It sounded like the wind, butit wasn’t blowing.”
Now,Hoffman is one of the more than 500 hurricane evacuees taking refuge atSouthern University’s F. G. Clark Activity Center.
“Rightnow, it’s a big relief because you’re not in that storm, so you can sleep, ”Hoffman said.
Allshe was able to bring with her was a small bag and the clothes on her back.Similar to the sentiments of other evacuees, she said she did not know what shewould do or when she could return home.
Itonly took two hours for the Minidome to fill to capacity when it opened on Aug.31, at the break of dawn. The air-conditioned, 7,500-seat arena is normallyused to house graduations and fans of Southern’s basketball games. Now it is ashelter, home to refugees who were soaking and waiting to be rescued frompolluted waters, most of them with just the clothes on their back.
Youngand old lie strewn on army-typed green cots that cover the gym’s court. Many ofthe sheltered have hung their clothes on bleachers and railings located outsidethe arena.
Sheltermanager Ralph Perrotta, has been a Red Cross volunteer for nine years. Asrefugees received donations of clean clothes, food and hygiene supplies,Perrotta, a 76-year-old San Antonio resident, said the shelter situation ofHurricane Katrina was the worst case he’d ever seen.
“OftenI manage a shelter, and the most people (we have) is 100,” Perrotta said. “Thelongest was two weeks and up to 40-50 people.”
Theshelter has as many as 40 Red Cross volunteers, plus other volunteers who areassisting evacuees with everything from providing numbers to help locatemissing family members, to providing comfort kits and soap and water forshowers.
Fivephysicians are also on staff, assisted by a host of nursing staff and studentsfrom Southern’s School of Nursing.
Dr.Debbie Kennedy of the Louisiana State University Health Science Center isdirector of the shelter’s health team.
Thoughprescriptive medication is not readily available, Kennedy said, evacuees arestill being evaluated for medical problems ranging from high blood pressure,diabetes and minor cuts and wounds. One pregnant woman went into labor and wastransported to a local hospital. A dialysis patient also had to be taken toanother facility.
