Hurricane Katrina - 2005

Hurricane Katrina was the costliest natural disaster as well as one of the five deadliest hurricanes in the history of the United States.  On August 29, Katrina's storm surge caused 53 different levee breaches in greater New Orleans submerging eighty percent of the city.  The total damage from Katrina is estimated at $81.2 billion and the confirmed death toll is 1,836, mainly from Louisiana (1,577) and Mississippi (238).  Nearly five years later, thousands of displaced residents in Mississippi and Louisiana are still living in trailers.

While Hurricane Katrina had lasting effects on the Gulf Coast region, this disaster also had an incredible impact on Acadian.  Our employees worked around the clock to help in whatever ways they could.  We manned some of the only working communication centers, dispatched all of our helicopters, transported injured victims to hospitals around the disaster area, and provided medical care for those seeking refuge in the Superdome.  This assistance was no small feat during the chaos that came after Hurricane Katrina, but Acadian employees accepted the challenge and proved to be an important ally for the victims of this natural disaster.

The articles below provide details of Acadian's heroic performance during this terrible time.  For more information and photos regarding Hurricane Katrina, choose one of the Katrina subpages in the sidebar on the left.

12/1/2005 The Anti-FEMA
By Patrick J. Sauer, Inc. magazine
As government officials dawdled, Richard Zuschlag didn't miss a beat. He sent his medics into flood-ravaged New Orleans, where they rescued more than 7,000 people.

9/17/05 Going (Down) by the Book
By John Tierney, The New York Times
NEW ORLEANS - When President Bush spoke from Jackson Square on Thursday night, across the Mississippi River a few men sitting next to a trailer watched him on a television powered by a generator. They listened respectfully, but they were not exactly dazzled.

9/12/05 Choppers fly to rescue, delivering food, help
By Roger Yu, USA TODAY
Immediately after the hurricane, Lafayette, La.-based Acadian Ambulance Service dispatched all seven of its helicopters to rescue patients trapped in New Orleans-area hospitals, delivering them to ambulances five miles away. Other manufacturers and charter companies sent 20 more to help with the task, says Richard Zuschlag, Acadian's CEO.

9/12/05 In The Ruins, Angels Of Mercy
By Nancy Shute, US News & World Report
Without the barest necessities, doctors and nurses struggle to keep hurricane victims alive
"When the crowds tried to take the ambulances away from us, we just abandoned the ambulances and locked them up," says Richard Zuschlag, chief executive officer of Acadian Ambulance Service in Lafayette , La.

9/11/05 Amid Busy Signals, Hopes Rested on Ambulance Firm That Could Still Communicate
By Gardiner Harris, The New York Times
The day after Hurricane Katrina struck, Richard Zuschlag might have been one of the few people who knew the extent of the catastrophe that hit southern Louisiana . But he could not reach anyone in Baton Rouge to tell them.

9/3/05 'There Was Real Heroism'
By Dafna Linzer and Peter Slevin, The Washington Post, MSNBC
Hundreds of sick and stranded patients who endured four nights in abandoned and flooded downtown New Orleans hospitals were rescued by military helicopters yesterday and moved to Louis Armstrong International Airport , where they had food and water but faced a new kind of misery: waiting in an overcrowded and understaffed terminal for transfers to medical centers around the country.

9/1/05 Rescuers rely on makeshift communications
The Associated Press
When the phones don't work, improvise. That's what emergency responders and civilians were forced to do in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, which trashed the telephone system on the Gulf Coast of Louisiana and Mississippi.