Parish Residents Find Memories Amid the Debris

There wasn’t much left worth keeping, but Paula Landry was determined to salvage something from the pile of kindling that was once her coastal Louisiana home. Under some boards and shingles, she found a tiny white baby sweater sprinkled with pink rosebuds, a lace christening gown wrapped in plastic, a sodden yellow baby book.

“It’s not much,” Landry said, gazing at the plastic tub that held her treasures. Her face crumpled and she fought for control. “I thought I was prepared for this,” she said. “I wasn’t.”

Here in Plaquemines Parish, 45 miles southeast of New Orleans, the eye of Hurricane Katrina left complete devastation. In neighborhood after neighborhood, entire houses were lifted by the winds and slammed into splinters blocks away.

Acres of grassland were turned into lakes, leaving small groups of cattle huddled on high, dry patches and a highway median. Old above-ground tombs crumbled and cracked in the ferocious winds; in at least one case, a stone tomb cover was blown away, exposing the bones and skull within.

“I didn’t expect it to be this bad. Not just nothing left,” said Amos Cormier, parish council chairman. “It’s like somebody blew them up.”

Cormier, 59, was taking his first real look at towns on the southern end of the fishing community Monday, hoping to learn along the way if his own house survived. When he finally saw the house that his five children grew up in, Cormier stood in stunned silence, then explained what had happened. His house had been blown off its foundation and a neighbor’s house, also flying through the air, had landed almost squarely in its place.

Surveying his and neighboring towns, Cormier took in the destruction with a quiet sadness. Here stood a town’s first franchise operation, a Subway sandwich shop, he said, pointing to what appeared to be a pile of scrap wood. That crumbling brick building was where he attended parties during high school. The back portion of the City Price Baptist Mission collapsed, but the front still stood, marked by a large wooden cross that seemed to be holding the structure upright. Peeking through large holes in the walls was an American flag, partially wound around a brass pole.

For nearly a week after the storm, few outsiders knew what had become of Plaquemines Parish, cut off from the world by downed phone lines and 10-foot-high floodwaters.

Three deaths have been confirmed by local officials, but the search for bodies begins in earnest today. Parish workers will go house to house to check for deaths, said Jesse St. Amant, director of homeland security for the parish. “It’s like opening a box. You don’t know what you’re going to find.”

State and federal assistance finally began arriving Sunday, but because power, water and phone service have not been restored to most of the area, the parish’s 26,000 residents have been asked not to return. It could be six months before those who live on the south end can check on their properties, parish President Benny Rousselle said.

There is very little to return to anyway. Downed trees are everywhere, pulled up by the roots or strewn with rakes, tablecloths, a child’s red truck. Caskets lifted from tombs have been dropped on earthen levees up and down the highway. Piles of glass and mangled metal are unrecognizable as homes that once sheltered families. Personal belongings -- ironing boards, a thigh exerciser, a highchair -- are randomly strewn across slimy expanses of mud and oil.

The day before the storm hit, Pamela Gainey insisted on putting the final touches on the remodeled master bathroom of her 200-year-old home, said her husband, Russell. “She finished at 5:30 a.m., then sat down and cried.”

On Monday, it was Russell Gainey who wept when he saw the pile of rubble that his lovingly restored home had become. “I sat down on the roof -- it was on the ground now -- and cried,” he said. “I was there at the house for two hours. I was trying to let it sink in.”

At the Landry property, Paula continued to pick through the piles of rubble, distraught but intently focused. Her husband, Clyde, had had enough. “I’ve got to get her out of here,” he said. He took her by the arm to a place where she could remove her rubber boots and drink some water.

Paula, 58, glanced briefly at her ruined house and turned away. Large goose bumps appeared on her arms and she seemed to shiver in the hot summer sun. This will be the last time she will return to her old house, she said.

“I’m not coming back,” she said quietly. “It’s gone.”