Scores of people in coastal Louisiana are still living in campers on dirt mounds or next to cement slabs where their houses once stood. Unresolved insurance claims and a shortage of supply and labor are stymieing building efforts. And weather forecasters are warning of more possible devastation to come.
Nine months after two back-to-back hurricanes hammered their towns, residents are still struggling to recover — even as they brace for another onslaught of storms in the season that starts Tuesday.
“We’re scared to death for this next season,” said Clarence Dyson, who is staying with his wife and four kids in a 35-foot-long (11-meter-long) camper with bunk beds while the home they had been renting in Cameron Parish undergoes repairs after Hurricane Laura.
The parish — a Louisiana designation similar to a county — is made up of small communities on the southwestern coast where residents have lived for generations, either working in the shrimp industry or more recently at one of the area’s liquefied natural gas plants.
The region features a stunning, peaceful landscape where families go crabbing together, birds perch on swaying strands of marsh grass and wind-gnarled oak trees grow on the long ridges — called cheniers — that rise above the marsh. About 70% of the parish is wetlands or open water.
Last fall, however, the area was battered by hurricanes that carved a path of destruction. On Aug. 27, Category 4 Hurricane Laura rammed into the coast near the town of Cameron with maximum winds of 150 mph (241 kph). Just six weeks later, Hurricane Delta, carrying 97-mph (156-kph) winds, made landfall about 10 miles (16 kilometers) away.
Meanwhile, forecasters with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration are predicting 13 to 20 named storms — six to 10 of which will become hurricanes and three to five of which will be major hurricanes — for this year’s Atlantic season, which runs from June through November.
The stress of rebuilding and worry about future storms have prompted some to consider moving inland. But many who did just that after Hurricane Rita in 2005 were still unable to escape Laura’s wrath. The 2020 storm was so powerful, it was still a hurricane when it hit Shreveport about 200 miles (322 kilometers) north of the coast.