When the Levees Broke: The Water Wasn’t Neutral

Hurricane Katrina was a storm. The catastrophe was the levee and floodwall failures that met a century of segregation and disinvestment. This episode follows the water into Gentilly, the Lower Ninth Ward, and New Orleans East, then traces what came next: the Superdome/Convention Center bottlenecks, the Gretna bridge blockade, and gunfire in the aftermath—Danziger Bridge (two people killed, officers later convicted/pleaded and served time), Henry Glover (killed; body burned; federal time for part of the cover-up), and Algiers Point vigilantes (shootings, a federal guilty plea and sentence).

We unpack the paper flood that followed: FEMA delays, insurance denials (wind vs. flood), and the Road Home grants that paid by pre-storm appraised value—penalizing historically undervalued Black neighborhoods. Then schools and housing: mass teacher layoffs, charter takeover, demolition of the “Big Four” public housing with fewer units rebuilt, and the long Katrina diaspora.

Receipts, not rumors—maps, statutes, and court records—on how a “natural disaster” chose its victims long before landfall.

Content note: disaster, shootings, racial violence, displacement.