Police, soldiers work to empty New Orleans (AP) Updated: 2005-09-08 06:58
NEW ORLEANS - Using the unmistakable threat of force, police and soldiers
went house to house Wednesday to try to coax the last 10,000 or so stubborn
holdouts to leave storm-shattered New Orleans because of the risk of disease
from the putrid, sewage-laden floodwaters. AP reported.
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A
Dublin (Ohio) police officer speaks into radio during a patrol in the
Bywater neighborhood, advising residents of an impending forced evacuation
September 7, in New Orleans September 7, 2005.
[Reuters] | "A large group of young armed men
armed with M-16s just arrived at my door and told me that I have to leave," said
Patrick McCarty, who owns several buildings and lives in one of them in the
city's Lower Garden District. "While not saying they would arrest you, the
inference is clear."
A frail-looking 86-year-old Anthony Charbonnet grumbled as he locked his
front door and walked slowly backward down the steps of the house where he had
lived since 1955.
"I haven't left my house in my life," he said as soldiers took him to a
helicopter. "I don't want to leave."
Mayor C. Ray Nagin ordered law officers and the military late Tuesday to
evacuate all holdouts — by force if necessary. He warned that the combination of
fetid water, fires and natural gas leaks after Hurricane Katrina made it too
dangerous to stay.
In fact, the first government tests confirmed Wednesday that the amount of
sewage-related bacteria in the floodwaters is at least 10 times higher than
acceptable safety levels. Dr. Julie Gerberding, chief of the Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention, warned stragglers not to even touch the water and
pleaded: "If you haven't left the city yet, you must do so."
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