Hurricane katrina caused how many deaths

Ten years after the disaster, then-President Barack Obama said of Katrina , "What started out as a natural disaster became a man-made disaster—a failure of government to look out for its own citizens. The city of New Orleans and other coastal communities in Katrina's path remain significantly altered more than a decade after the storm, both physically and culturally. The damage was so extensive that some pundits had argued, controversially, that New Orleans should be permanently abandoned , even as the city vowed to rebuild.

As of this writing, the population had grown back to nearly 80 percent of where it was before the hurricane. Katrina first formed as a tropical depression in Caribbean waters near the Bahamas on August 23, It officially reached hurricane status two days later, when it passed over southeastern Miami as a Category 1 storm. The tempest blew through Miami at 80 miles per hour, where it uprooted trees and killed two people. Katrina then weakened to a tropical storm, since hurricanes require warm ocean water to sustain speed and strength and begin to weaken over land.

However, the storm then crossed back into the Gulf of Mexico, where it quickly regained strength and hurricane status. Read a detailed timeline of how the storm developed.

On August 27, the storm grew to a Category 3 hurricane. At its largest, Katrina was so wide its diameter stretched across the Gulf of Mexico. Before the storm hit land, a mandatory evacuation was issued for the city of New Orleans, which had a population of more than , at the time. Tens of thousands of residents fled.

But many stayed, particularly among the city's poorest residents and those who were elderly or lacked access to transportation. Many sheltered in their homes or made their way to the Superdome, the city's large sports arena, where conditions would soon deteriorate into hardship and chaos. Katrina passed over the Gulf Coast early on the morning of August Officials initially believed New Orleans was spared as most of the storm's worst initial impacts battered the coast toward the east, near Biloxi, Mississippi, where winds were the strongest and damage was extensive.

But later that morning, a levee broke in New Orleans, and a surge of floodwater began pouring into the low-lying city. The waters would soon overwhelm additional levees. The following day, Katrina weakened to a tropical storm, but severe flooding inhibited relief efforts in much of New Orleans.

An estimated 80 percent of the city was soon underwater. By September 2, four days later, the city and surrounding areas were in full-on crisis mode, with many people and companion animals still stranded, and infrastructure and services collapsing.

The city of New Orleans was at a disadvantage even before Hurricane Katrina hit, something experts had warned about for years , but it had limited success in changing policy. The region sits in a natural basin, and some of the city is below sea level so is particularly prone to flooding. Low-income communities tend to be in the lowest-lying areas. Just south of the city, the powerful Mississippi River flows into the Gulf of Mexico. During intense hurricanes, oncoming storms can push seawater onto land, creating what is known as a storm surge.

Those forces typically cause the most hurricane-related fatalities. As Hurricane Katrina hit, New Orleans and surrounding parishes saw record storm surges as high as 19 feet.

Levees can be natural or manufactured. They are essentially walls that prevent waterways from overflowing and flooding nearby areas. New Orleans has been protected by levees since the French began inhabiting the region in the 17th century, but modern levees were authorized for construction in after Hurricane Betsy flooded much of the city. A neighborhood east of downtown New Orleans remains flooded on August 30, A woman gets carried out of floodwaters after being trapped in her home in Orleans Parish, Louisiana, on August 30, Police watch over prisoners from Orleans Parish Prison who were evacuated to a highway on September 1, Daryl Thompson and his daughter Dejanae, 3 months old, wait with other displaced residents on a highway to catch a ride out of New Orleans on August 31, Thousands were looking for a place to go after leaving the Superdome shelter.

Residents of Saucier, Mississippi, line up to get gas on August 31, Hanging from her roof, a woman waits to be rescued by New Orleans Fire Department workers on August 29, People seek high ground on Interstate 90 as a helicopter prepares to land at the Superdome in New Orleans on August 31, A woman cries after returning to her house and business, destroyed by Hurricane Katrina, on August 30, , in Biloxi, Mississippi.

People search for their belongings among debris washed up on the beach in Biloxi on August 30, People try to get to higher ground as water rises on August 30, , in New Orleans.

People wade through high water in front of the Superdome in New Orleans on August 30, President George W. August 29, Katrina makes landfall near Grand Isle, Louisiana as a Category 3 storm with winds near mph.

Wind and water damage to the roof created unsafe conditions, leading authorities to conduct emergency evacuations of the Superdome. Fatalities directly or indirectly. Read More. Ray Nagin, the mayor at the time, said the death toll in the city could be as high as 10, A FEMA simulation of what would happen if a similar hurricane struck the area had put the number at more than 60, Although the losses never reached those levels, death in New Orleans was inescapable in the weeks after the levees failed — for its residents, for responders and for a horrified nation.

News outlets headlined the latest counts of the dead and occasionally showed grisly images of bodies floating in flooded neighborhoods. Like many post-Katrina efforts, the project to count the dead was hampered by natural and institutional obstacles. Robert A. Jensen arrived about a week after the storm. The official effort to recover bodies had stalled as local and federal agencies decided who would do so — and how.

Collecting, identifying and counting the dead was an emotionally wrenching, often gruesome, sometimes thankless job. Kenyon workers had to walk through hospitals where the power had been knocked out. Extreme heat decomposed bodies. The sheer size of the affected areas meant each body might have to go through several checkpoints on its way to the morgue. And each stop could mean the loss of valuable information.

Nearly every day, Bob Johannessen, a spokesman for the state health department, updated the death toll for Louisiana based on the latest data and shared it with the press , taking care never to extrapolate.

Arriving at accurate numbers was difficult. Gabriel, 60 miles from New Orleans. It was only after two and a half months had passed that St. By its own admission, Louisiana never finished counting the dead. Its last news release on the topic, from February , put the statewide toll at 1, Three months after that, in August , Louisiana counted 1, victims , with people still missing.

Today, when asked about the Louisiana death total, the health department cites a study that reviewed death certificates and concluded that there were victims.

But that study said the total could be nearly 50 percent higher if deaths possibly linked to the storm were included. Among federal agencies, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has been the primary one focused on determining how many people died because of Katrina regionwide.