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The poison of sea salt

The flooding in Vermilion Parish became something I could touch and feel today. You pick up a leaf, a twig, anything on the ground that was covered by more than 24 feet of water, and white powder flakes off. That powder is sea salt, other minerals, toxic sludge and who knows what else was in the water, and it dried on everything... Grass, rice fields, houses, fence posts, dead animals, everything. It's annoying, it looks like snow on farm fields, and it well and truly kills everything green it touches, perhaps for years. It will take huge amounts of rain to dilute the poison enough to let crops grow or to let cattle graze. With no crops and nothing to feed cattle, you don't make any money, and you go out of business. Unfortunately, usually a family business.

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Team East, aka Team Martin

Marisa Buchanan and cameraman Brad Houston shot these photos on Monday.  We featured a couple of them in this post on that day.  Here are the rest.  Sorry it took so long to get them to you.  Now that we've figured out how to display multiple images in a photo "flipper," we'll aim to do more of these visual presentations as "After the Storm: The Long Road Back" continues.

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Team West, aka Team Carl

Two-and-a-half days into this Gulf Coast journey, it's time we introduced the teams. Marisa already mentioned the personnel who get Martin Savidge on air every night. I'll post more pictures from them soon. But first, here's a look at the cast of players that help Carl Quintanilla broadcast from towns west of New Orleans. They produce and edit their reports in the field, out of a satellite truck NBC News calls "Cowboy." Click "Next" below the photo to flip through the seven images.

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Highway to hell

We're driving on 90 West out of Biloxi... the true highway to hell.

It's a miracle the road is still open when everything around it is shattered, crushed and closed. Don't get me wrong, the highway has problems of its own. Many of the bridges are out or unsafe and four lanes often have to become just two, sometimes one. We're always skirting sink holes or places where the road is simply gone. Drive just one mile on this road and you will see the worst Katrina has to offer and never question why it costs so much or will take so long to rebuild. Instead, you'll wonder how can it be done at all.

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A salty story

Our story tonight is about salt. And rice.

The salt came from the Gulf's seawater. It shoved its way 35 miles inland to Forked Island, La. and Charles Broussard's Flying J Ranch. It flooded his rice fields and soaked them for two weeks.

When it was finally pumped out, it left a salty, white residue on anything worth harvesting. The cows have nothing to graze. And now, Broussard is afraid every time he tills the soil, that salt will contaminate the soil deeper and deeper.

Is Louisiana facing a looming farm crisis? Broussard thinks so. And that's bad news for a state where agriculture -- everything from sugar to rice to cattle -- is every bit as important as gambling.

We're hanging out with the cows right now. They're nice enough, but I don't think they like Al.

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The drip, drip, drip of progress

Both times I've returned home to Chicago from New Orleans since Katrina I've told people that the devastation is so much worse than it looks on television. When I return home after this trip, I'll surely be telling people that there is SO MUCH MORE devastation than you ever see on television.  It's mind boggling to think that after three days we still haven't even seen any damage caused by Katrina, only Rita.

As you drive across the Gulf Coast one thing that's striking is how much work is being done, yet how little progress seems to have been made. I don't mean that as a slight to the thousands of workers I've seen from all over the country - they're away from their families, working 18 hour days, living in motel rooms if they're lucky, RVs or tents if they're not. It's just that the job is so massive, it's almost like trying to move a boulder by dripping water on it.

But there are small signs of a divot in that boulder.Yesterday I left Cameron Parish to scout ahead for today's story.  Driving through the heart of Cajun Country I saw literally thousands of brand new power line poles - the wood so fresh it was still green - dotting the wreckage of small towns along Highway 82.  In many places these poles were the only thing standing.

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Overnight at the Isle of Capri

I woke up about 3 a.m. wondering who was taking pictures in my room. Took a while to realize the source... the fire alarm. So I rolled over and went back to sleep. As Marisa mentions below, we were in Biloxi, where everything is not as it was given the scouring Katrina gave this gambling town. I felt the alarm, like everything else here, was broken and merely protesting the crime of nature committed against it.

We arrived after dark. It's a weird scene. The high-rise hotels blaze like space shuttles on launch pads and give the false impression they're fine. They're not. In fact, most aren't even open.

Given all the ruin you can see in the photos Marisa took from outside her hotel room window, you wonder how the hotel escaped. As you check-in, you realize it didn't. All the carpet of the ground floors is gone and we roll our bags across the cement slab. In some areas the walls and cement are cracked or holed.  But once you board the elevator and head to the room it's as if nothing has happened at all.

Dinner is served in a large conference room. It's 10 bucks and a buffet. Good food, filling food, not great food. But given nothing else is open anywhere near, that bumps it up to some of the finest food around. There's a bar at the opposite end. The only way you know that is a guy standing behind a plastic counter. Domestic beer is $2, imports $3. It's not too busy.

There are lots of folks staying here and none are on vacation. Contractors mostly, laborers and emergency personnel. In the lobby, the sounding of heavy equipment at work pounds late into the night. It will be like this for a long time to come. These days in Biloxi it's about the only thing you can bet on.

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Room with a view

This is the view I woke up to this morning. We stayed overnight in Biloxi, Miss. at the Isle of Capri. We got in late so it was mostly dark except for this building on the eastern tip of this town.

I had seen all of NBC’s reporting out of Biloxi, including Brian’s trip here, but because it was so dark I couldn’t appreciate any of it, until of course we came across a National Guard roadblock. It reminded me of how often I had passed through one of those in New Orleans throughout September. When we followed their directions, however, we realized we would not be able to get to our hotel. Every road leading to it was blocked. We could see the lit structure from every angle -- we just couldn’t get there!

So we headed back through to the Guard pass and went on across -- the only road to the farthest point at the tip of Biloxi. It’s mostly gutted in the lobby but the rooms are clean and accommodating -- a sharp departure from what you see out the window when you wake up in the morning. As morning light often does, it brought the harsh light of reality to this place... houses completely demolished and barges clearly not in the right spot –- that was my scenic view.

Another view out my hotel window

We head out today to a few less traveled parts of western Mississippi, to an area called Long Beach and some towns across the bay. My producing partner out here, Doug Stoddard, and his fearless crew Todd Williams and Mike Concepcion, who we linked up with again last night, are going to head up to Pine Country in Washington Parish, La., just on the border with Mississippi. They’ll give us a read on what Martin hopes to report on Thursday. The eye traveled right over that area, and as we have learned, just because it wasn’t on the coast doesn’t mean it wasn’t impacted.

Time to meet the guys downstairs and head out.

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Lucky Lafayette, La.

We're checking out of the Days Inn this morning in Lafayette, La., which, I can confidently say, has THE loudest ice machine in the western world. Especially if you're in room 231.

It's easy now to tell when you're in an environment of hurricane victims (like a hotel). The front desk has stacks of flyers. Some give advice on "how to find housing online." Others are clearly intended for children: "Do You Wonder WHY?" one reads, featuring a picture of a sad boy and images of a hurricane. Inside, the reader is invited to turn to God. A sticker on the back has the address of a nearby church.

Lafayette escaped largely unscathed by Rita. Much of the city never even lost electricity. (We know because we rode out the storm here, in a parking garage.) The city's saving grace? Hurricane Lily. It was the last major storm to hit nearby, and it stripped many of the city's trees. This time, there was little left to be broken by the wind -- little debris to knock down power lines.

The city feels back on track: Ray's Appliance Center has a sign that says, "Happy Holidays!" It reminds me of a much different sign at the Holiday Inn in Port Arthur, Texas, on Monday: "We're one day closer to being normal."

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How to help the schools

If anyone was moved to want to help the schools mentioned in my story Tuesday on Nightly News, their greatest need is money, particularly tuition assistance for the students at both schools. Their parents lost everything and so did both schools. Financial aid is in short supply. Tuition for a student at St. Peter the Apostle is $200/month or $2,000/year.

Checks can go to:
St. Peter the Apostle Catholic School
1703 Telephone Rd.
Pascagoula, MS 39567
Contact person is Sister Bernadette Peters. The school's phones still don't work, so she's given me permission to publish her cell phone: (228) 327-4302.

Resurrection Catholic school
3704 Quinn Dr.
Pascagoula, MS 39581
Contact person is Principal Elizabeth Benefield. Her phone number is (228) 762-7207. You can also visit the school's Web site: www.rcseagles.com.

In addition to financial support, the schools need: Printer-copy paper, bookshelves, storage cabinets and craft paper.

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