Yes, fantastic reports, thankyou very much. I saw bourbon st in 2004 approx, what a story that city has now.

There was one bar open on Bourbon Street a few hours after the storm passed. There was no power. The place was dark, but full of people. Some looked like homeless people that must have come out of their hiding places just a few hours earlier. We have bought a few of the still cold beers from that place, and are now across the street. It was the next morning that we discovered the flood, and set up the clinic at the hotel.

We had spent Saturday night at this bar watching the first feeder band rains out the open doors, talking to the cute young bartender and to the other locals who were all trying to decide if they would evacuate or ride it out. After the storm died down, we went walking through the Quarter on Monday. The bar looked so dead all boarded up. It was such a contrast to how warm and festive it was as the storm was bearing down on them.

This is from the stairwell on Canal Street Monday morning near the end of the winds of Katrina.

It's Tuesday at 10 am. This is the 3rd floor French Quarter Bar "infirmary" being set up with supplies taken from the Walgreens. The woman in the pink worked for the agency that ran the conference at which we had become stranded. The blue baseball cap guy works for the Ritz. The green shirted doctor takes care of HIV patients at Cook County jail, and was at the conference. The tables in the background, near the stage, became the triage area. We set up a bleach water hand cleansing station on the bar later. We sorted the medicines, and moved them into the alcoves by the French doors. We had stations to interview the patients at little tables in this central area. We laid mattresses down on the floor near from where the picture was taken, and "admitted" a guy who dislocated his shoulder, a demented older woman who had worn out her daughter, and I can't remember who else. At one point, we made a "private" room with sheets held up by people so a pelvic exam (using 2 teaspoons as a speculum) could be done. The wooden floor in this room warped up into rolling hills from the humidity a few hours after this picture was taken.

We were staying in a room that faced an interior well. There was no power, so there was no TV. I went to the roof to see whatever there was to see as soon as I got up that morning. This is how I found out that the levees had broken, and the city had flooded. It's hard to describe the chill I felt when I looked over the ledge and saw this. It was absolutely silent. The streetcar rails were not yet submerged. I could see a few cars pulled up on them to try to get out of the water. I took my picture, and then ran down to the room. Then we went to all the rooms of our friends and "called a STAT meeting" in our room. They all had interior rooms too. Noone else knew! I said, "Let's all go to the roof, now." There's another picture of us up there, taking it in and deciding what to do. It was on the roof that Joe seriously re-proposed setting up an infirmary. (It had come up the night before, but I scoffed at it, because we didn't have licenses in La. or malpractice coverage or anything, and the city was still functioning theoretically...we didn't know it was flooding.) An hour or so later, Joe and some others went with two policemen across the street with big floating laundry bins, and took away 5 carloads of medications and supplies, and we were at work...refilling medications, treating cuts and scrapes, and treating people who were getting sick in our building. (We joked that New Orleans was always a most European of American cities, so providing free health care "fit" so well.)

My partner took this picture inside the Canal Street Walgreens on Tuesday morning at 9 am. Two policeman from NOPD had let in him and 5 doctors from our group, to get the medicines out so we could set up our infirmary in the Ritz hotel bar. They made two more trips later for things we needed but forgot. The third trip was for dog and cat food. (He dropped the good camera into the water on that trip, and we lost some great pictures). We had gone shopping here on Saturday afternoon to buy flashlights, water and food when we realized we were stranded and not going to get out before the storm came. When the group came to the door, there were 20 people waiting to get in... The police said to them, "Y'all get your chance...but the doctors go first."

This scaffolding, in front of a building being converted to condos, sharing the block with the Ritz, collapsed during the storm. This picture is taken Monday at 5 pm. Canal Street, in the distance, was still dry. There was no power, TV, etc. so we did not know the city was filling up with water and that people were drowning a few miles away. The next morning, when we awoke, this was all under water, and the Ritz went into fortress mode, with Matt and his shotgun posted at the entrance to fend off the looters.

It was Tuesday, about 2 or 3 pm. There were people packed onto all the balconies of the projects. The first floor of their buildings (the red rooves), was flooded. Later that day, we could see a large column of smoke from far off to the right near the port, and smaller ones scattered about as various things burned. This day, I saw only two or three helicopters whenever I went up there to the roof to try to borrow the satellite phone to try to get someone to come get us out. (I know it's ridiculous, but we didn't really know anything but what we could see in front of us.)

This was taken Wednesday night, the last night we stayed in the Ritz. I am the guy with the soaked blue T shirt. We are in the Ritz "French Quarter Bar", on the couch near the door. We had set up our infirmary here. That night, everyone was confined to their rooms (but us, the doctors), so we didn't see very many patients. We had broken down the pharmacy (courtesy of the Walgreens across the street, with the assistance of the last two cops downtown), with the thought that we would soon be evacuated. Then it looked like we weren't going. So, I had spent several hours trying to re organize the medicines into an accessible system...worked up a big sweat. There was no water, for 3 days by this time. We had lights in this one room when the generator was on. The French doors were kept open, so we had lots of mosquitoes. My partner, in the white shirt, slept that night on the couch, and woke up with 100 ant bites. Sergeant Matt, with the shotgun, protected the building from looters. He was stranded there by the flood, couldn't get back to Jefferson Parish from helping his father at a nearby hotel through the storm, and ended up staying with us. We all thought he was the greatest, so he's at the center of the picture, with his gun. Despite everything, it was a wonderful night.