2002-08-30 15:03:58+00 by Pete 1 comments
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#Comment made: 2002-08-31 04:31:44+00 by: James Edmunds
A partner and I had just started a weekly alternative newspaper in Lafayette, LA, about 20 miles from the incident, when this disaster occurred, and we made our first lavish news expenditure renting a helicopter to get a look and to take some photos (I was the editor, Steve was the publisher).We flew over the lake and it looked for everything like a big tub of water with a pulled drain plug in the middle. The area was supposedly off-limits to flying but our pilot snuck in anyway, nervously scanning the skies because all sorts of planes and copters were also taking a look, and since it was off-limits there was no air control other than watching your ass. I was snapping pix and worried that we were going to be in a really, really dumb air crash. I was also stringing for Newsweek a lot in those days, and reported the story for them as well as for my own paper.
Before too long, maybe within half a day, the lake refilled by drawing in water through the stream that connects it to the bay, and eventually the Gulf of Mexico. It's rather amazing, in retrospect, that no one was badly hurt or killed... neither on the lake surface nor in the air.
-James Edmunds, blogging at Poor Clio, www.jamesedmunds.com/poorclio