August 29 – Hurricane Katrina makes landfall along the U.S. Gulf Coast, causing severe damage, killing over a thousand people and dealing an estimated $108 billion in damage.
New Orleans (Wikipedia)
New Orleans (/ˈɔːrl(i)ənz/ OR-l(ee)ənz, /ɔːrˈliːnz/ or-LEENZ, locally /ˈɔːrlənz/ OR-lənz; French: La Nouvelle-Orléans [la nuvɛlɔʁleɑ̃], Spanish: Nueva Orleans) is a consolidated city-parish located along the Mississippi River in the southeastern region of the U.S. state of Louisiana. With a population of 383,997 according to the 2020 U.S. census, it is the most populous city in Louisiana, third most populous city in the Deep South, and the twelfth-most populous city in the southeastern United States. Serving as a major port, New Orleans is considered an economic and commercial hub for the broader Gulf Coast region of the United States.The National Weather Service’s New Orleans/Baton Rouge office issued a vividly worded bulletin on August 28 predicting that the area would be “uninhabitable for weeks” after “devastating damage” caused by Katrina, which at that time rivaled the intensity of Hurricane Camille.