At about 8:00 a.m., some large plate glass windows (rated for wind speeds of 150 miles per hour) failed and blew into the building causing windows in the back to blow out. He recalls the wind was still strong, but in watching the levee and surveying the view, there was a general feeling that the city had “dodged a bullet.”
From their vantage, they could see there was still 3 to 4 feet until the water reached the top of the levee. The floodwalls had gates that were closed, and they could see how high the water was because it was squirting from both sides of the closed gates. They could see the level of the water and see it squirting out from the sides of the levee.
Joe recalled having people calling him asking how the levee was looking. “It was about 8:30, maybe 9:00 in the morning, and I was saying that it looked like ‘we skated’.”
It was shortly after 9:00 a.m. when they began noticing that the water was starting to rise in the parking lot behind the building. They reported the rising water to the District Chief. The Superintendent was monitoring the radio and he asked them to keep him informed of the rate of rise. Joe remembered Captain Paul Hellmers (also of Engine 18) in particular saying that he thought there might have been a break in the levee appearing to come from the 17th Street Canal. Joe and others members of Engine 18 were speculating that perhaps the winds were so intense that they were blowing the water over the top of the levee.
Joe credits Capt. Hellmers for being the first to come to the realization that the levee had failed. At 9:23 a.m., Hellmers reported the water was rising rapidly and was 4 feet from the top of the inside of the levee. In the Lake Marina Tower parking lot, the water had risen 18” in 15 minutes. Later it appeared to be rising about 6” every 15 minutes.
At 9:44 a.m., Firefighter Lee Beba reported that from the rate of water rise, it appeared that the levee had failed, but he didn’t know where. Joe recalled Capt. Hellmers commenting that that he thought the levee may have broken to the west of Lake Marina Tower as the water seemed to be flowing from that direction. It turned out he was correct. At 9:50 a.m., Capt Hellmers reported a water rise in the neighborhood of 2 to 4 feet. At 10:08 a.m., he reported the water had risen up to the rooftops.
About 10:30 a.m., after the eye of storm had passed over, Firefighter Gabe King and Joe went up to the 14th floor to get a better view. Gabe pointed in the direction of the 17th St. Canal and said to Joe, “Captain, it looks like the levee is broke over there.” At this time, the wind was still swirling with gusts up to 80 miles per hour, and the rain was coming in at a 90-degree angle.
Joe confirmed Gabe’s observation and immediately called it in, stating that there was a possible 4 to 10 foot break in the levee. After retrieving the binoculars Gabe, Joe and Capt. Hellmers, who was recording the levee with a video camera, confirmed the breach.
The men moved to the 18th floor for a better view. Here they had a better vantage point and saw another breach of 20 feet not visible from the 14th floor vantage point. They could see that the floodwall had collapsed along a 200 feet section on top of the levee between the breaks, but the levee remained intact beneath and little water flowed over the levee as the level of the water in the canal was roughly equal with the top of the levee. The water was flowing out like a river through the 2 breaches.
When Joe radioed in the message, he was able to say, “Break in the levee, confirmed by 3 people with binoculars.” He knew there were many people listening on the other end, and he didn’t want there to be any confusion or miscommunication whatsoever.
After the breach was reported, Joe recalled that Chief Charles Parent, the Superintendent of the New Orleans Fire Department, called them on the radio to get the details of the break in the levee. Joe and Capt. Hellmers described to him in detail what he and his crew were observing.
Joe was ordered to monitor the levee and to report back every 15 minutes. At that time, the levee break was about 10 feet long in one area and about 20 foot long in another. Joe recalled that 2nd District Chief Chris Mickal, whose house, like Joe’s, was near the 17th Street Canal said, “He'd remember my report for the rest of his life.”
As the Lakeview neighborhood around the 17th Street Canal was home to many of the firefighters in the department, Joe recalled getting many calls from firefighters radioing in to get updates as to the state of the flooding. All the houses were flooded. Having all those firefighters radioing in and asking the status of the neighborhoods and having to relay that all the houses were flooded brought morale down. At this point, the magnitude of what they were observing began to settle in their hearts and souls.
The implications of the levee breaking for the people and City of New Orleans were significant. A feeling of foreboding and uncertainty quieted the crew as their realizations of the severity of what they were seeing began to dominate their thoughts. Capt. Hellmers recalled that upon seeing the levee breaches, they knew that the city’s fate was sealed and that many lives would be lost. He recalled a horrible helpless feeling knowing that people were drowning nearby and they couldn’t help anyone until conditions improved. Joe indicated, however, that if they knew where the people were they would have tried to save as many as possible. He began to think back to all the people he had seen in the city during his calls on Sunday. It went through his mind just how many people were out there, which meant of course, there could be a lot of people dying as the water was rising.
He always thought about such things, as any Firefighter does, when a call goes out indicating that ‘people are trapped at a certain address’. He would always stop and say a prayer that those people would get out, or that the firefighters on the scene would pull them out to safer areas. In considering such circumstances, it was relevant to one house and one call. Now the sentiment coupled with fear and dread extended to a whole city. It was Joe’s fear that what he was seeing was going to be worse than the 9-11 disaster.
They learned later that it was not just this area affected. Levees had failed throughout the city. 80% of the city of New Orleans was under from 4 to 25 feet of water. Joe later learned that in his home water had risen between the first and second floor, a depth of about 8.5 feet. Of course, there were variations in elevation throughout the city, which meant some areas were spared from the really deep waters.
The main thing to the crew of Engine 18 at this time was that they knew there had to be a lot of people trapped; they knew that the very instant they were able to do so, they would be going out to help as many people as they possibly could.
In the early afternoon on the previous Saturday, Joe’s wife, Shana and their children left the city. Around noon on Sunday, Joe finally convinced his mother to leave the city as well. His mother met Shana and the kids at Shana’s parents’ home in Tylertown, Mississippi, about a two-hour drive north of New Orleans. Knowing they were safe was obviously a huge relief for Joe. He could focus on the task at hand and not worry so much about the safety of his family.
Immediately after seeing the breaches, Capt. Hellmers and Firefighter King (both tri-athletes) began searching the area from their vantage point on the 18th floor for nearby boats that they could use for retrieval. The closest boats seen were about a block away in the front yard of a home on West Robert E. Lee. There were aluminum flat boats, a wide 16-foot boat and a 14-foot boat. The 16-foot boat was the one they hoped to retrieve. Firefighter King was anxious to go for the boats, but Capt. Hellmers and Joe agreed that they needed to wait for the winds to subside to have a better chance of success and less chance of serious injury.
At about 1:00 p.m., Firefighter King and Capt. Hellmers swam out to retrieve the boat. The current was extremely strong, with west winds gusting to about 50 miles per hour, close to the 17th Street Canal breach and the rushing water.
When they reached the boats, the 16-foot boat had sunk and the 14-foot was about to sink. It was floating in about 7 feet of water with the trailer still strapped to it and about a foot of water in it. King cut the straps with his pocket- knife. They then balanced atop an adjacent chain-link fence and bailed