Published: September 04, 2008 11:00 pm      

Evacuees return after Gustav despite circumstances

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Despite shortages of power and food, residents rushed back into the city and surrounding areas Thursday after Hurricane Gustav, willing to gamble on circumstances closer to home rather than to gut it out in shelters, hotels or other havens far away.

Heavy traffic was reported on highways leading into south Louisiana and a busload of insurance adjusters was spotted in Jefferson Parish.

The first bus returning New Orleans residents evacuated by the government as Gustav approached made a surprise arrival in the city. Police Maj. Michael Pfiefer said the motor coach delivered 30 people from a shelter in McKinney, Texas — some directly to their homes.

Later Thursday, the Regional Transit Authority lined up buses at Union Passenger Terminal to take people home if more buses showed up unexpectedly from shelters. Mayor Ray Nagin said the official return would begin Friday. As many as three — depending on the need — would open in the city for returnees who couldn’t get to their homes because of a lack of electricity.

‘‘Conditions in the city continue to improve,’’ Nagin said.

Almost 2 million people got out of the way of Gustav, which made landfall Monday at Cocodrie, about 70 miles southwest of New Orleans. The state Department of Social Services said 29,000 people received state help to evacuate either by bus, train or plane.

At the height of the storm, 85,000 Louisiana residents were in shelters both in and out of state. As of midday Thursday, 63,000 remained in 10 states — in Louisiana, Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, Oklahoma, Tennessee and Texas.

More than 800,000 Louisiana utility customers were still without power, including much of metropolitan New Orleans, Baton Rouge and surrounding areas and coastal communities, utility officials said. Entergy Mississippi reported about 10,000 customers still in the dark.

Nagin said Thursday he hoped that nearly all city residents — 90 to 95 percent of them — will have power by this weekend. In contrast, utility officials said their best estimate for restoration in the Baton Rouge area, including East Baton Rouge, Ascension and Livingston parishes, is three weeks.

The emerging challenge for many evacuees was finding food and fuel.

A Salvation Army truck has been distributing meals in the shadow of the Louisiana Superdome since Tuesday. Intermittent rain kept most people away, so long lines were a rarity.

As he waited his turn, Everett Stewart, 55, said he evacuated to McComb, Miss., with his wife and their two teenagers. Stewart’s family returned to New Orleans overnight because he had to get back to work.

After his first shift back, Stewart said he stopped at the truck to grab three containers of red beans and rice for his family. Rain and a lack of electricity spoiled his plans for a barbecue, he said.

Stewart said they evacuated for Hurricane Katrina, too, but it took two weeks before they could return home. ‘‘Gustav is a four-star compared to Katrina,’’ he said. ‘‘Good thing we didn’t take a serious punch on this one.’’

A regional spokesman for the Salvation Army said they distributed 1,000 meals from the Superdome location on Tuesday in just four hours and passed out 8,000 more on Wednesday.

The truck is one of 10 set up to distribute food in New Orleans. There are 15 in Baton Rouge, which was raked by Gustav, and one each in Amelia, Houma, Franklin, Grand Isle, and Morgan City.

Lines formed at a Breaux Mart grocery store only minutes after it reopened in Uptown New Orleans on Thursday morning, with plywood still covering its doors and windows. The store had to discard most of its meat and poultry but still had plenty of packaged food on its shelves.

Pam Carr, 48, smiled as she wandered through the store’s aisles, grabbing produce to replace what spoiled when Gustav knocked out her power.

‘‘Compared to Katrina, it’s a blessing to be able to come back a few days after the storm,’’ she said.

Meanwhile, New Orleans hospitals, devastated by Hurricane Katrina three years earlier, were in good shape after Gustav. That was not the case, however, elsewhere.

Earl K. Long Medical Center, the public hospital in Baton Rouge, was all but closed after a power failure there and the storm did severe damage to Leonard J. Chabert Hospital, the public facility in Houma, which evacuated all patients before the storm.

In Plaquemines Parish, local government spokeswoman Karen Boudrie said a levee breach that flooded farmland is nearly plugged. She said residents were being allowed into the parish’s hard-hit southern end, where the Mississippi River empties into the Gulf of Mexico.

Federal levees rebuilt after Hurricane Katrina continued to hold, and only minor glitches were reported with the massive drainage pumps installed at New Orleans canals after the August 2005 hurricane. Much of New Orleans is below sea level and depends on the pumps, built by Florida-based Moving Water Industries Corp., to keep water flowing into Lake Pontchartrain.

Stephen Shurtz, urban forestry and landscape manager for Baton Rouge’s Department of Public Works, said unblocking roadways and entrances to homes is a top priority for the city-parish. More than 50 parish crew members are working up to 16-hour days to remove downed trees, limbs and other debris and open up roads for emergency vehicles, he said.

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Associated Press writers Becky Bohrer, Janet McConnaughey in New Orleans and Melinda Deslatte in Baton Rouge contributed to this story.



AP-CS-09-04-08 2028EDT