The Great Deluge: Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans, and the Mississippi Gulf Coast by Tulane University History Professor Douglas Brinkley is a no-holds-barred, stark look at the week of August 27 – September 3, 2005 when Hurricane Katrina roared ashore devastating the upper Gulf Coast of the United States and causing massive flooding in the city of New Orleans. It is not for the faint of heart.
Brinkley is unflinching in his goal of uncovering not only exactly what happened, but also why it happened. Why in spite of all the predictions of massive destruction made by the Weather Channel and the National Weather Services’ best meteorologists, were there so few who were prepared on the ground? Even more troublesome why did it take so long to marshal the proper resources to rectify the situation AFTER the storm passed?
Brinkley digs deep and he digs hard. He is unsparing of political parties and government officials on every level. The failures after Katrina were multiple, multi-layered, and far reaching. It’s very hard to find the good guys but not at all difficult to find ones to blame. He also looks hard to find those who were heroic & self-sacrificing in the face of enormous difficulty. Woven amongst the historical and much documented details are the stories of individuals who lived those first horrific days all along the hurricane’s path and in flooded out New Orleans. Told in documentary style, those stories nevertheless are gut wrenching and deeply moving.
Brinkley gives excellent historical background on the levy system and politics of New Orleans and Louisiana. His footnotes are extensive. He also spotlights many other historical details in his quest to explain how, in a country as great as the United States, with such a history of philanthropy in disasters all over the world, things could go so horribly wrong in our own backyard.
I was riveted when I didn’t really want to be. The story of human failure and suffering that just wouldn’t quit was something I really wanted to stop reading about, but just couldn’t. Well-written, gripping, and sad, this is not a tale for the queasy, but is a must-read for those who believe that history and human nature are repetitive & in order to grow, we must first know where we’ve failed.
tweet this!
