Hurricane Katrina - Drowning Inside a Locked Cell

Terry could have been any tourist in my neighborhood - arrested on a public drunk charge in the French Quarter.  Tragically, his arrest was just before Hurricane Katrina.  

After Katrina passed but before the water from the broken levees seeped into the jail, Orleans Parish Prison staff locked the inmates into their cells then turned off the water and power for the lights.  In his first floor cell, Terry's sleep was broken by screaming.  As he put his foot down to investigate, his shoe filled with water.  Then the fetid flood waters slowly rose to Terry's ankles, knees, waist and his chest.  What started as an inconvenient administrative arrest was evolving into the primal fear of death by drowning.     

Unaware of how high the water would rise, Terry and the other inmates climbed their cell bars.  Some panicked at their imminent drownings.  Some called for their mothers.  Some drowned.  

      In this piece, Terry tells us his thoughts as he contemplates his own death.  Thoughts that have stayed with him to this day.  Perhaps the same final thoughts shared by so many New Orleanians who trusted the construction of the levees and their homes more than the perils of evacuation.  Thoughts so many of us contemplated as we witnessed the drowning of an American city just five years ago.  


Produced by WWOZ show host and French Quarter resident, Jamie Dell'Apa