New Orleans chaotic, residents sent to Texas

NEW ORLEANS - About 23,000 refugees stuck at the New Orleans Superdome arena after Hurricane Katrina flooded the city will be evacuated to Houston under plans announced on Wednesday, as looters and high water sowed chaos.

A fleet of buses was to begin ferrying some 23,000 refugees from the storm-battered Superdome to shelter in the Houston Astrodome 550km away.

In New Orleans, engineers tried to plug a leaking levee that allowed lake water to flood into the city after Katrina struck the US Gulf Coast. Stranded people were running out of food and water and growing desperate as authorities sought ways to get them out.

"We will be either loading them by boat, helicopter, anything that is necessary," Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco told ABC's "Good Morning America."

Looting erupted as people broke into stores to grab supplies, television sets, jewellery, clothes and computers.

"It's a lot of chaos right now," Louisiana state police Director H.L. Whitehorn said.

Katrina's death toll was more than 100 and expected to rise much higher, but efforts to count the dead took a back seat to assisting survivors.

President George W. Bush cut short his vacation in Crawford, Texas, to return to Washington, where the administration was putting together an aid package for recovery and cleanup. Air Force One dipped low enough for the president to view the destruction as the plane flew over stricken areas.

The Bush administration said it would release oil from a strategic reserve to offset losses in the Gulf of Mexico, where the storm had shut down production, and it relaxed anti-pollution fuel standards with an aim towards making more petrol and diesel available.

US crude-oil prices eased below $70 per barrel, but analysts said they expected retail petrol prices to vault well over $3 a gallon in most parts of the country as early as this weekend.

Katrina struck Louisiana on Monday with 140 mph (224 kph) winds, while slamming into the coasts of neighboring Mississippi, Alabama and western Florida.

At least 110 people died in Mississippi, which was struck by a 30-foot (10-metre) storm surge, but local officials said the toll could be in the hundreds. Search crews patrolled with cadaver dogs to find the dead.

US Sen. Mary Landrieu told reporters she had heard at least 50 to 100 people were dead in New Orleans.

Louisiana officials said 3,000 people had been rescued, but many more waited to be picked up in boats that cruised flooded streets or helicopters that buzzed overhead.

"I'm alive. I'm alive," shouted a joyous woman as she was ferried from a home nearly swallowed by the flood.

New Orleans flooded after the raging waters of Lake Pontchartrain tore holes in the levees that protect the low-lying city, then slowly filled it up.

Attempts had failed on Tuesday to plug a 60-metre gap with sandbags and concrete barriers, but officials said they would keep trying.

The US Army Corps of Engineers planned to try to fill the breach with giant 1,360-kg sandbags.

The lake should return to normal levels within about 36 hours, and the water now flooding New Orleans would begin to drain, said US Army Corps of Engineers senior project engineer Al Naomi.

But New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin estimated it would be 12 to 16 weeks before residents could return. The floods knocked out electricity, contaminated the water supply and cut off most highway routes into the city.

- REUTERS