📋 Looking Back at Hurricane Katrina 20 Years Later (AARP Article)

FROM THE ARTICLE.

20 Years After Katrina, These Older Adults Are Still Stepping Up.

Our reporter returns to the Gulf Coast to talk to six 50-plus residents who have made it their mission to rejuvenate their communities.

By David Hochman, AARP. Published August 22, 2025.

In New Orleans, longtime residents once sat on their porches and waved the weather forecasters along, certain the Mississippi would mind its manners. If you’d weathered Betsy in 1965 and other big blows, the wisdom boiled down to a shrugged “We’ve been through worse.”
Then came Katrina. When the levees failed on August 29, 2005, nearly 80 percent of New Orleans was submerged, making it one of the costliest residential disasters in U.S. history. Nearly 1,000 people were confirmed dead and 200,000-plus jobs disappeared almost overnight. Though those 75 and older made up just 6 percent of the city’s population, they accounted for more than half of all lives lost.

USE LINK BELOW TO READ THE ARTICLE.

https://www.aarp.org/events-history/hurricane-katrina-anniversary/