I can understand why New Orleans' mayor Ray Nagin had this sternly worded Civil Emergency message issued to the residents of New Orleans: he had lived through Hurricane Betsy in 1965 and Hurricane Camille in 1969; so he knew Hurricane Katrina was going to flat out destroy New Orleans and he had to do something drastic to convince the most stubborn residents of New Orleans that Hurricane Katrina was going to destroy the city and that they needed to get as far inland as possible. Many residents of New Orleans who fled the city before Hurricane Katrina struck (along with the survivors) have since rebuilt their lives in Shreveport, Louisiana.
This is nearly the same transcript that was written as the official Area Forecast Discussion by the New Orleans office of the National Weather Service on Saturday, August 27th, 2005, as Katrina was approaching her maximum strength of 175 mph/909mb. Based on these bone-chilling words, Mayor Richard Nagin ordered a full evacuation of the city of New Orleans on Saturday. Unfortunately, many were unable to evacuate, with deadly and catastrophic results.
