Will we get nightly death-toll updates for several months?

(somber voice) "Today, two more bodies of hurricane Katrina victims were found..."

I keep hearing about all of those people who "went up into their attics," and I just don't see that happening on a grand scale. When water starts rising, going up into a closed-off space with no exits doesn't seem like the first thing that would pop into people's heads.

Will we get nightly death-toll updates for several months?

Probably. Flip over to MSNBC for a second (as though we could stand any more exposure than that) and you'll see they are still running their stupid countdown since Katrina hit.

Morons.

Depends on the speed and violence of the water.

It rose so fast for some people that they were drowned against their first floor ceiling, while the rest of the family managed to barely get up the stairs.

Most ceilings these days, if the place used trusses, are just sheetrock. You can punch through it...if you know enough to punch through it that is.

Well, getting trapped in an attic is understandable. Water rising in your house - your choice comes down to heading out into 130 MPH winds smacking debris into your walls with the force of a well swung baseball bat plus 10 feet of churning rubble-filled water....., or going higher in the house, shielded from the elements and hoping the water stops rising.

It's a gamble. Some folks have been rescued after managing to poke a hole in the attic roof and attract attention. Others clearly lost their gamble.

People were coached to have a pickax, a saw and a sledgehammer in case they had to punch their way up and out.

I can't imagine being stuck in an overhead like that for days, outside temps hitting 97. It'd be over 130 inside.

Well, getting trapped in an attic is understandable.

Ummm, the biggest flooding came AFTER the storm.

the rather optimistic article you cited makes no allowance for the massive decontamination and toxic waste cleanup that will be required. that alone will take months, after the city dries out, and prior to people coming back into the city. i would hope the administration would err on the side of extreme caution here. last thing conservatives need is, five or ten years from now when people are getting wierd diseases and having deformed kids, to have jesse jackson screeching that the republicans sent all those poor black people back to new orleans , knowing it wasn't yet safe.

You're assuming that the community you live in is germ- and weird-disease free. I can guarantee you it's not. That's why we have so many cleaning products on the market.

Two things:

When New Orleans flooded, it was mostly measured in inches per hour, not feet per second.

The "horribly contaminated' water they're talking about is running levels of E. Coli about ten times the legal safety limit (in other words, about what you get in a bad cheeseburger). The EPA isn't finding a lot of other bacteria, and the major toxin they're seeing is lead. Some industrial sites are supposedly leaking some nasty stuff, but it's not widespread. The're worried that there might be things like cryptosporidium or cholera, but they haven't turned up in great amounts. There's also a lot of oil and gasoline, but you get that in regular rainfall in all towns.

After a couple of months of drainage and rainfall, most of the nasty stuff will be out in the Gulf, and most of the rest of it will be going away after a few hose-downs with chlorinated city water.

I figured this is a good place to post this.
Nationally known author and TV commentator Michelle Malkin posted the following on her web site: PASCAGOULA, MISS., NEEDS HELP
By Michelle Malkin · September 08, 2005 09:13 AM
which prompted people from all over the United States to call in donations and volunteer their help. One gentleman from Tenn. donated a truck to deliver supplies which he is personally delivering. A couple cancelled their planned vacation to China to come and help the victims.
The community sends a BIG THANK YOU to Michelle and her readers who responded. They prove One person can sure make a difference.

Cirby; Absolutely!

Dave in Texas: I'm a carpenter in NY and even up here attics can push 120 or more in the summer. I refuse to work in one except 1st thing in the morning.

I can't see ANYONE surviving in an unpowered, unsupplied attic for 4-5 days in LA in September, especially since quite a bit of video shows hip-roof construction, with no gables/gablevents.

Maybe it should be code to install hatches like on flat-roof tenements, secured with simple slidebolts.