By Kellie Rowden-Racette

On Monday, Aug.29, 2005, Hurricane Katrina, a vicious Category 5 storm, slammed into the Gulf Coast states of Louisiana and Mississippi. The extent of the destruction was unlike anything previously seen. Less than 48 hours later, the levees that kept Lake Pontchartrain from flooding the streets of New Orleans gave way, placing much of the city under water and sending the death toll unbearably high. President George W. Bush gravely declared Katrina to be “one of the worst natural disasters in our nation’s history.”

But it wasn’t over. On Thursday, Sept. 22, 2005, New Orleans and the coastal communities of Texas braced themselves for yet another storm — Hurricane Rita. Rita made landfall as a Category 3 storm with winds of more than 120 mph and flooded the already battered Louisiana coast again.

The back-to-back storms affected millions of people, including many in the military community. Some monitored the storms, some were evacuated, some came back to help recovery efforts. The following are firsthand accounts from those who were affected professionally and personally by the deadly storms of 2005.

Lt. Michael Silah, NOAA, 35, is an aviation safety officer and a WP3D aircraft commander (“hurricane hunter”) stationed at McDill AFB in Tampa, Fla. His crew flew over the eye of Hurricane Katrina as the storm intensified and prepared to hit the Gulf Coast.

Hurricane season starts early around here and we had a pretty active July, so we were definitely well-prepared for Katrina. But as we watched it, we saw it change every day — it got better organized and was turning into a major storm. By Sunday, we knew it was going to be a big problem for the Gulf Coast.

We approach every storm the same way, but I will say that anytime you see a Category 5 storm that is going to make landfall, it adds an immediate sense of gravity. Really, I was surprised by the damage; even after watching it on television, when we flew damage-assessment flights, the scope was surprising. Our pilots were flying 12-hour shifts delivering food and supplies to the victims. Clearly New Orleans was a disaster, but then you fly east to the Mississippi and it was just gone — like someone had taken an eraser and wiped out the Mississippi coast.

I have friends from that area and many who live — well, lived there. Some are doing better than others. NOAA has a lot of assets in that region, and while we are supporting all citizens in the recovery, we are also sup-porting our NOAA families who were affected, which makes it more of a personal matter.

I love what I do. I love working for NOAA, and I’m much easier to get along with when I’m flying. I’m just as happy going to work as I am going home.

Jennifer Dunkelberger, 27, is married to Capt. Tyson Dunkelberger, USMC, who is stationed with Marine Forces Reserve in New Orleans. The Dunkelberger family was visiting relatives in Virginia when they heard about Katrina’s impending approach toward their house hundreds of miles away.

My youngest son was being baptized that weekend, so we were busy with family and hadn’t seen the news at all. Then at 6 a.m. on the Saturday morning before the storm hit, we got a phone call from our neighbor Kathy. She asked me, “What do you want me to save from your house?” and I was like, “What are you talking about?” Then we saw the news. Kathy had been watching our dog for us, so she grabbed a few of our things and evacuated with her family and our dog.

Luckily we have a two-story house, so everything on the second floor was OK. But we lost everything on the first floor — my wedding picture, a painting my grandmother made me of the church at Quantico, my husband’s uniform sword that had been his dad’s ... it’s all gone. Two days after the storm my other neighbor, Monica, called me and said, “Jennifer, you don’t have a front door.” Then she told me our refrigerator was in the foyer. The weirdest thing was that the laundry I had folded before we left for Virginia was still folded and on the couch. The couch had just floated across the room. It was surreal to hear her describing what she saw. That’s when I started crying.

Tyson was ordered to remain in Virginia, so my dad and his dad drove down to our house to try to assess the damage and retrieve a few things. When they got there, they went upstairs and found a note on our dresser [from people who took refuge in our home]. ... They left all sorts of stuff and their pets made a mess of the carpets, but really I think it’s just wonderful that our house saved lives. Luckily for them we were military, because they found my husband’s MREs. That was all they took.

I’m just grateful for our lives. ... Watching the storm on television, it was like, here we go. It’s the storm everyone in New Orleans always talked about and knew was coming. And there it was. I felt, well, we’ll lose the house, but at least we’re all here and safe.

Lt. Todd Fisher, USCG, 36, was a helicopter rescue pilot during the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. He and his copilot, both stationed at the Air Training Center in Mobile, Ala., rescued 58 people in a three-day period after the levees broke in New Orleans.

We evacuated all the aircraft and went to Jacksonville, Fla., when Katrina was approaching. When we came back, we weren’t sure what we were coming back to. There was a lot of damage to the hangar and our station, and we were cleaning it up when the levees in New Orleans broke. It was the first one, then the second one, then the third, then chaos.

There were thousands of people trapped. When we flew over the city, we could see people on what seemed like every other rooftop. What was once a flourishing city was now a sea of humanity. It was so surreal. We were in a short-range helicopter (HH65) and could only pick up six people at a time, hoisting each of them up one at a time. So we had to keep going back.

The fact that we were doing this in an urban environment was really difficult. In the Coast Guard, water usually means safety. There aren’t usually physical hazards, and it’s what we do. But here we had towers, some buildings, and electrical wires, all sorts of things. And this water was nasty — oily and mucky. This was nothing like we’d been trained to do, and we were making it up as we went along, using our open-water skills. We were actually threading rescue baskets through the wires to reach the victims. There was a lot of teamwork and initiative involved.

[What I will remember the most are] the faces of the people. We took turns hoisting people up, so I would see their faces as they came up — the kids, the babies. They were so happy to be rescued, but they had a look of despair, too. Usually when we rescue people they are overjoyed because it’s in the open water after a boat accident or something. But these people were leaving their entire lives behind and didn’t know what was going to happen next. It’s something I hope I never see again, but I’m glad we were there. It gave us the opportunity to do what we do best.

Brig. Gen. Michael Kiefer, INARNG, 58, spent 24 days overseeing and coordinating National Guard relief efforts in 31 Mississippi counties north of the coastal area in the wake of Katrina. Before he returned home to Indianapolis, the citizens of Macomb, Miss., granted him honorary citizenship as a thank-you.

We were to return Mississippi to a state that [its residents] could manage without outside help. They wanted to restore power, make sure the water was potable, and repair the schools. But basically we were going to do whatever [the people of] Mississippi wanted. They had some definite things they knew they wanted, others were ad hoc, like security. They didn’t really know they needed that until the need was upon them.

The damage was indescribable. Several communities and Highway 90 along the coast were just gone. I come from Indiana and we know tornadoes, but it was like 100 tornadoes on steroids had gone through. It was the breadth and depth that surprised all of us. The media coverage doesn’t even begin to capture it. All around you could see the foundations of what were houses, apartment buildings, or offices and restaurants, and all that was left of them were the steps leading to nowhere.

Oh, they’ll recover, it’s just a question of time. But the coast will take a lengthy period of time ... the highways are gone, and the cleanup alone is a big job. But the attitude I saw is that they’ll get this done sooner rather than later.

You know, the area had suffered so much and there was so much damage that I fully expected these people to be a bit short-tempered. But I found it remarkable how patient the citizens and the civic leaders were — they took it better than I would have. And they seemed really grateful for our help. And the volunteers and my soldiers were amazing. They all worked incredible hours, caught all the complaints, but still they kept going. I think the soldiers brought a sense of calm, and it was amazing the sense of professionalism the uniform brought. They set a tone that said, “We’re going to help you recover.” And this is why I joined the Guard in 1969 — to help folks who need it. That was our theme during this: “We’re Americans helping Americans.”

Cmdr. Brian Klock, USNR, 49, was on assignment in Washington, D.C., helping with recovery efforts for Navy air stations and personnel affected by Hurricane Katrina when he got word that his wife, Susan, and 9-year-old daughter, Taylor, were evacuating their home outside Houston as Hurricane Rita approached.

It looked like Rita was really going to hit us on Thursday morning, so Wednesday night Susan and Taylor evacuated. They got in the car to go to Austin, which is usually a three-hour drive. It took them 18 hours. I didn’t sleep that night. I was a combination of guilty and worried. I knew Susan was tired and driving so I called her every hour just to hear her voice. And when I talked to Taylor, I heard a different voice. I no longer heard a little girl — I heard a young lady who was trying to be strong for her mom. I was so impressed.

Rita tracked just to the east of us. We got 70 mph winds, and a tree landed on our house, but that’s it. It’s not too bad. I honestly thought we were going to be left with a slab.

Everyone’s OK physically, I guess. Emotionally and financially, not so much. ... I have friends who still live in the city, and one said the worst thing is that the storm didn’t sweep their house completely away. If it had, they would have been able to just walk away from it all.

I grew up on the coast. I went through hurricanes Betsy and Camille in the 1960s. That’s kind of the problem: People who live here have been through big storms before, so when we see another one coming, we think, “We can make it.” But there are always bigger storms and it’s not a matter of if, but when. … It’s definitely going to influence our future decisions. I’m just glad everyone in my family is OK. All the material things can be replaced, and the emotions will heal, but you can’t bring people back from the dead.

Col. Glenn Zauber, USAF-Ret., 60, is MOAA’s chief financial officer. In early October, he spent two weeks as a volunteer for the American Red Cross distributing meals to Hurricane Rita victims in Dayton, Texas.

I’m at the stage in life where I have my work, but I realize that if I don’t go in for a few days, the place isn’t going to fall apart. And for something like this, if I don’t go today, when will I go? There wasn’t a more ideal time, and bottom line: I didn’t have a good excuse not to go.

They asked our group to help with the mass feedings. There were 16 of us and they said, “Here’s a MapQuest [map] to Dayton, Texas. Get six trucks, four cars, six radios, and go to the Baptist church.” When we got to the church, they said, “Here’s a map of the feeding areas. Starting tomorrow at lunch, you will take food to these areas.” By areas they meant churches, community centers, and even the sides of the road.

This was a very poor rural area. Before the hurricane these people were just getting by. When Rita was approaching, they were told 25-foot waves were going to hit their town. After the storm hit, there was no power, which also meant no water as water is supplied by well pumps.

One woman told me that before the storm, she had $1,000 life savings. After filling her car with gas, evacuating, staying in a hotel for several nights, and then coming back, she had $7 to her name. We heard stories like that all the time. The main thing everyone needed was water and ice. They were down to survival mode, and it sort of pulls you up short.

It was so rewarding to see people helping people. This was a huge disaster and no one had a clue how to handle the logistics, but they were so desperate for warm bodies to help that no one was worried about how it got done. The nice thing was everybody was very pleasant and said “thank you” whether we could help them or not. They understood we were amateurs and were trying to help them the best we could.

But the thing I remember most is [realizing] how fortunate [my wife] June and I are. I will remember what’s important in life. People are important. People matter.