'A desperate SOS'

COMBINED DISPATCHES
NEW ORLEANS -- Storm victims were raped and beaten; fights and fires broke out; corpses lay out in the open, and rescue helicopters and law enforcement officers were shot at as flooded-out New Orleans descended into anarchy Thursday. "This is a desperate SOS," the mayor said.
Anger mounted across the ruined city, with thousands of storm victims increasingly hungry, desperate and tired of waiting for buses to take them out.
"We are out here like pure animals. We don't have help," the Rev. Isaac Clark, 68, said outside the New Orleans Convention Center, where corpses lay in the open, and he and other evacuees complained they were dropped off and given nothing -- no food, no water, no medicine.
Frustration and anger
About 15,000 to 20,000 people who had taken shelter at the convention center to await buses grew increasingly hostile. Police Chief Eddie Compass said he sent in 88 officers to quell the situation at the building, but they were quickly beaten back by an angry mob.
"We have individuals who are getting raped; we have individuals who are getting beaten," Compass said. "Tourists are walking in that direction, and they are getting preyed upon."
A military helicopter tried to land at the convention center several times to drop off food and water. But the rushing crowd forced the choppers to back off. Troopers then tossed the supplies to the crowd from 10 feet off the ground and flew away.
In Washington, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said the government is sending in 1,400 National Guardsmen a day to help stop looting and other lawlessness in New Orleans. Already, 2,800 National Guardsmen are in the city, he said.
But across the flooded-out city, the rescuers themselves came under attack from storm victims.
"Hospitals are trying to evacuate," said Coast Guard Lt. Cmdr. Cheri Ben-Iesan, spokesman at the city emergency operations center. "At every one of them, there are reports that as the helicopters come in people are shooting at them. There are people just taking potshots at police and at helicopters, telling them, 'You better come get my family.'"
In hopes of defusing the situation at the convention center, Mayor Ray Nagin gave the refugees permission to march across a bridge to the city's unflooded west bank for whatever relief they could find. But the bedlam made that difficult.
"This is a desperate SOS," Nagin said in a statement. "Right now we are out of resources at the convention center and don't anticipate enough buses."
At least seven bodies were scattered outside the convention center, a makeshift staging area for those rescued from rooftops, attics and highways. The sidewalks were packed with people without food, water or medical care, and with no sign of law enforcement.
'Just a nightmare'
Lizzy Kelley, 48, and her family said the convention center overflowed with panicked people, human waste and dangerous tempers. Kelley said she was threatened at gunpoint, slept on a concrete floor and waded down a flooded stairwell, where she encountered the floating carcasses of animals.
"It was just a nightmare, nothing but a nightmare," Kelley said.
During the night, an incoming tide of newcomers pushed aside her family. "If you don't make room, you're going to die," they told her.
Police officers, deputies from across Louisiana and even Drug Enforcement Administration agents swarmed the waterlogged city Thursday, trying to maintain order. Their efforts will be bolstered by thousands of National Guard officers, military police and deputy sheriffs from around the country who have been dispatched to the area.
The number of troops dedicated to the Gulf Coast region is expected to reach 28,000 by today -- the largest U.S. military deployment ever for a natural disaster.
Thousands feared dead
Death estimates still ranged in the thousands, with countless people missing, including rhythm and blues legend Fats Domino. The 77-year-old singer-pianist, whose real name is Antoine Domino, lives in New Orleans' low-lying, flooded 9th Ward.
Capt. Michael Pfeiffer, 51, the chief of staff for the bureau chief for operations of the New Orleans police department, is most worried about the death toll in the city's lower 9th Ward where he used to work. More than 100,000 people live in the neighborhood that was inundated by water, and few evacuated. The lower 9th one is of the city's poorest neighborhoods.
Citywide, Pfeiffer said the death toll is unimaginable. "How many people died on 9/11?" he asked. "Three thousand? Here, add a zero to that."
Estimates of the damage reached $50 billion, by far the highest ever associated with a U.S. natural disaster.
Desperate to get out
Thousands of refugees arrived at the Houston Astrodome on Thursday weary from days in the wretched conditions at the Superdome, happy to get a shower, a hot meal and a cool place to sleep.
An estimated 23,000 people were expected to arrive by bus from the Superdome, but only about 4,000 people had arrived early Thursday night. About 80 buses had arrived with more expected in a steady stream overnight.
At the hot and stinking Superdome, fistfights and fires erupted amid a seething sea of tense, suffering people who waited in a line that stretched a half-mile to board yellow school buses.
After a traffic jam kept buses from arriving for nearly four hours, a near-riot broke out in the scramble to get on the buses that finally did show up, with a group of refugees breaking through a line of heavily armed National Guardsmen.
One military policeman was shot in the leg as he and a man scuffled for the MP's rifle, police Capt. Ernie Demmo said. The man was arrested.
By Thursday evening, 11 hours after the military began evacuating the Superdome, the arena held 10,000 more people than it did at dawn. National Guard Capt. John Pollard said evacuees from around the city poured into the Superdome and swelled the crowd to about 30,000 because they believed the arena was the best place to get a ride out of town.
As he watched a line snaking for blocks through ankle-deep waters, New Orleans' emergency operations chief Terry Ebbert put blame for the inadequate response on the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
"This is not a FEMA operation. I haven't seen a single FEMA guy," he said. He added: "We can send massive amounts of aid to tsunami victims, but we can't bail out the city of New Orleans."
FEMA officials said some operations had to be suspended in areas where gunfire has broken out.
Filthy conditions
The street outside the convention center, above the floodwaters, smelled of urine and feces, and was choked with dirty diapers, old bottles and garbage.
"They've been teasing us with buses for four days," 47-year-old Daniel Edwards said. "They're telling us they're going to come get us one day, and then they don't show up."
Every so often, an armored state police vehicle cruised in front of the convention center with four or five officers in riot gear with automatic weapons. But there was no sign of help from the National Guard.
At one point the crowd began to chant "We want help! We want help!" Later, a woman, screaming, went on the front steps of the convention center and led the crowd in reciting the 23rd Psalm, "The Lord is my shepherd ..."