Evening star., 1947-09-20
Hurricane
Continued From First Page. J

east of New Orleans. The east end
of the lake is open to the Mississippi
Sound.
A meager radio report received by
q ham operator in jackson, Miss,
from the Naval Reserve station at
Gulfport, told of six killed by the
storm in the Gulfport- Biloxi area
and about 400 injured.
First Aid by Flashlight.
Only bare informs ton was obtain
able, but the picture in that Gulf
resort area was grim. Battered
houses, splintered boats and first aid
workers driving themselves through
the night to administer first aid by
f1ashlight to the injured collected In
the arnnory. -,
As an aftermath of the hurricane,
tornado rose at Apalachicola, Fla,
cutting 250-foot wide swath for
three miles through tnat Northwest
Florida town. One hundred we're
injured, IA seriously enough to re-
quire disqualification,
From Biloxi westward to New
Orleans information poured in by
every conceivable means, which yi1s;
dicated that srSeion was a. fnsss%of
wrecked houses. ruined vacation
cottages, destroyed crops and boats
STAYED in from stem to stern.
Railroad causeways were reported
down or under water. So were high
ways. Seawalls were badly battered.
Bayous were In flood with great
area inundated.
Hundreds Are Homeless.
And all through the region hum
dreds were reported homeless. These
homeless found what shelter they
could in schoolhouses and public
buildings during the pitch darkness
Of the night which saw wind-driven
rains beating through the skeletons
of windows and pounding the roofs
with steady, maddening monotony.
New Orleans streets were piled
with debris-wrecked automobiles.
torn signs, uprooted trees and
fallen power lines. Con1munica-
tions we're out all over town
and telephone linemen and pub
lie utility crews 1abored nightly
to restore service. Mayor de Lesseps
Morrison counted the damage at
$1,000 900, roughly. He said there
was at least s1,75o000 damages to
automobiles and homes. He dis
tributed the remainder Of the es-
innate to miscellaney, such as signs.
shrubbery, trees, plate glass win
dows and seawalls.
Pascagoula, Miss, honeymoon
haven, and an industrial community
founded mostly on shipbuilding, was
reported q general mess. Five hun
dred residents were reported home
less by the Red Cross and Disaster
Relief Chairman Ksrl Weisenberg
said all of the towns 1000 homes
were damaged to some extent.
There were at least $50 homes with
water standing feet deep on the
first floor. Nearly every private pier
along the water front was gone, leav-
ing only blackened piles standing
gauntly in the breakers. Even the
handsome pavilion at the end of the
municipal pier was washed and
blown into so much driftwood.
Just bit west Of Psscagoula, the
railroad causeways over Bay St..
Louis were washed out. The Louis
vile 81 Nashville said the washout
there and at Biloxi would cause sus-
pension of traffic over the scenic
route from Moile indefinitely.
At Biloxi, Mayor G. B. Cousins, jr..
called on the Army at Keesler Field
to patrol the beaches and shoot, II
necessary, to halt any looting. Like
neighboring Pascagoula. Biloxi was
hard hit. The beaches were strewr
with wrecked yachts.
The heavily running seas and high
winds wiped tiny fishing villages
UP and down the coast from the
face of the map. There was no word
yet from the bayou country where
some live their lives without setting
foot on earth more than once a
month and that only when they
come to the coast for groceries.