Hurricane Katrina hits Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama

I have family who live in Hattiesburg, Mississippi, and my mom tells me that we have been unable to reach them so far. We are anxious to hear good news about Charlie F. Brooks, Jr, his wife, Vivian, and the rest of their family there. (Update: Everyone is safe. My grandparents got in touch with them yesterday.)

New Orleans* is getting most of the post-Katrina press, even here in Austria, but it's important to remember that the affected area is much wider, stretching as far as Mobile, Alabama, 90 miles (150 kilometers) east of the Big Easy. Also in Mississippi, Waveland, a coastal city, was apparently completely washed away.

The Austrian media is trying to get the scale across here, saying that the affected area is as big as the UK (Gross Britanien), or three times as big as Austria.

My mom and dad live just outside of Houston, where "Mayor Bill White asked residents today to open their garages and homes to hurricane refugees." My mom is donating clothes, my dad is baking cookies for a church dinner for storm refugees, and both are looking for other ways to help out, including providing housing to refugees.

I will keep an eye on the news over the next few days and try to post some links and first-hand news that I can get from home.

* link to a radio interview with New Orleans Mayor (Burgermeister) Ray Nagin.

- A Google map of the affected areas in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama
- New York Times interactive map of affected areas
- Google Earth images of affected areas
- Interdictor - a New Orleans Blog
- "Google Everyhwere" in Forbes