A glance from Gustav
New Orleans levees hold as weakening storm brushes by
It was the first test of New Orleans' new and improved levees, which are still being rebuilt three years after Hurricane Katrina. And it was a powerful demonstration of how federal, state and local officials learned some of the painful lessons of the catastrophic 2005 storm that killed 1,600 people.
A handful of Utah volunteers were in Louisiana and Texas as the storm bore down on the Gulf Coast.
Jana Sweeny, a Red Cross disaster officer from Salt Lake, was in Baton Rouge, where strong winds downed power lines, darkening thousands of homes Monday.
"There are a lot of families that came in from New Orleans," Sweeny said. "They suffered this devastation during Katrina and were getting their lives back on track. It's just too soon."
Still, spirits appeared to be high, Sweeny said, adding that residents and relief agencies were better prepared for Gustav after suffering through Katrina missteps.
Peggy Mecham, of Ogden, was also in Baton Rouge. Mecham has volunteered for the Red Cross for 25 years and spent seven weeks in Louisiana after Katrina.
"I saw the people open up their hearts and homes," she said. "We hear so much about all of the crimes that go on in our communities, and to go out and work among people who have been affected and see the goodness in their hearts, it's a wonderful thing."
Mecham and other volunteers in Baton Rouge have been confined to their shelter since Sunday night.
"I can see uprooted trees, trees lying on roofs, but I haven't seen any flooding," Mecham said Monday. "There's work that needs to be done, and we won't know what that is until tomorrow" when volunteers were expected to be allowed out of their shelter and onto the streets.
There was growing optimism late Monday that New Orleans would soon reopen for business. Mayor Ray Nagin cautioned that today would be too early for residents to return to a city largely in the dark, but their homecoming was "only days away, not weeks."
"I was hoping that this would happen, that we would be able to stand before America, before everyone, and say that we had some success with the levee system. I feel really good about it," Nagin said.
A mandatory evacuation order and curfew remained in effect, and nearly 80,000 remained without power after the storm damaged transmission lines that snapped like rubber bands in the wind and knocked 35 substations out of service.
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