Three weeks after Katrina I could stand it no more. I had to see what the hurricane had done to the live oaks and the swans at City Park. I knew that the military and emergency crews were attending to the people but I also knew that few people were thinking of the swans and the waterfowl. With the floodwaters came toxic chemicals and food was scarce. I could no longer wait.
With a special "all access" pass from the Governor, I got through "three check point charlie's" manned by National Guardsmen carrying rifles (New Orleans was off limits to everyone and under martial law) with a photographer friend in a four wheel drive jeep. We manuevered our way over fallen trees and debris and went wherever we could throughout the Park surveying the damage and looking for the swans and the five cygnets born in April. The dead vegetation and the mud left from the stagnant water that sat in the park for two weeks provided an odor of death and since we were the only two people in the vast Park we felt like the last people on earth. The silence was deafening.
In spite of the fallen branches we found the live oaks to be in fairly good condition. Most of the trees that were down were of another variety. We photographed and searched as quickly as we could because the health hazards in the Park were great and the heat was almost 100 degrees. We found only one swan, one of two two-year olds that were daughters of the pair we were seeking along with the cygnets. The swan did not appear to be in good shape and was in a state of shock, to our eyes. The Park usually entertained many people every day and people came especially to feed the waterfowl. With no people around the swan must have also felt like the last swan on earth.
This is the bridge where I photographed the wedding of a Canadian couple on August 3.
I served on the Board of this Park for 14 years so I have a very special affection for it.
When I returned to drier land in Metairie after our trip into the Park I sat in my car in a deserted shopping center with the air-conditioner full blast. I took off my soaked shirt to put on a dry one. After what everyone had been through no one would have given a second thought to a woman sitting in her undergarments in a car. Such was the mood of the time.