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I grew up in Gulfport.  Moved to Oxford in'96.  Three days after the storm we (Oxford Fire) arrived at the EOC which was set up at the Harrison County Courthouse.  We were there for heavy rescue(recovery).  Search teams would go out and locate the dead then come back and give us the GPS coordinates.  We'd then go into the debris field with jacks, chainsaws, etc. and recover the bodies. The majority of the debris field was south of the RR tracks.  The tracks acted as a damn. Every structure that was south of the tracks and detroyed,  ended up in the 1/2 mile x 30 mile debris field mentioned earlier.

When we got our first assignment (Right of off HWY 90), my chief said, "You grew up here, show us the way."  "No problem, chief"  Except there was a problem.  All of the landmarks were gone.  I'll never forget that initial feeling of being totally lost in the town I grew up in.  I resorted to counting the streets from east to west so we could find out where we were supposed to go.  

Friends of mine lived 5 miles from he beach.  Still got 8 feet of water in there home.  They lived on the Bayou.  If you lived by water, you got flooded.  Some friends lost everything they owned and were damn lucky to survive.

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Can someone post a link to the video in OP?

Please  

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I, along with three others from my department, spent about a week in the Waveband/Bay St. Louis area starting a few days after Katrina hit.  I will never forget the sights, sounds and smells from that area.  The destruction, the sense of family, the sadness. I have some pictures somewhere. The state of Florida contributed so much to that area.  The canteen trailer, shower trailer and the personnel.    

There was a rather large sail boat that was out of the water and in a wooded area near the bay.  The trees were not touched and it looked as is some one had just dropped the sail boat out of the sky with no damage to any of the trees around it.  The train tracks near the bay were all twisted and the bedding was washed away.  The high water mark in the Walmart could be sienna the interior walls.  I was amazed at how high it was inside of the building.  These are just a few of the things I can remember from that time.      

I had a conversation with one of the residents, an man probably in his late 50's, who was at the supply area in Bay St. Louis.  Hearing his first hand account of what happened and how he just did not know what to do at that point was just about heartbreaking.  

A funny moment was when a guy found his AK and ripped off a few rounds to see if it would still function.  The AFT and the local PD guys there were not to happy about it.  I also stopped some ICE guys, if I remember correctly, for driving around during the curfew hours. The only part that sucked for me was I worked the night and had to sleep during the day.  It was to damn hot for this norther guy.  That and the damn helicopters taking off from the Walmart parking lot about 100 feet from where I was trying to sleep.

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http://www.ar15.com/forums/t_1_5/1321874_Airborne_Engineers_during_Hurricane_Katrina____My_story_.html

have this saved. go through it every few months. still shocked

Quoted:
I grew up in Gulfport.  Moved to Oxford in'96.  Three days after the storm we (Oxford Fire) arrived at the EOC which was set up at the Harrison County Courthouse.  We were there for heavy rescue(recovery).  Search teams would go out and locate the dead then come back and give us the GPS coordinates.  We'd then go into the debris field with jacks, chainsaws, etc. and recover the bodies. The majority of the debris field was south of the RR tracks.  The tracks acted as a damn. Every structure that was south of the tracks and detroyed,  ended up in the 1/2 mile x 30 mile debris field mentioned earlier.

When we got our first assignment (Right of off HWY 90), my chief said, "You grew up here, show us the way."  "No problem, chief"  Except there was a problem.  All of the landmarks were gone.  I'll never forget that initial feeling of being totally lost in the town I grew up in.  I resorted to counting the streets from east to west so we could find out where we were supposed to go.  

Friends of mine lived 5 miles from he beach.  Still got 8 feet of water in there home.  They lived on the Bayou.  If you lived by water, you got flooded.  Some friends lost everything they owned and were damn lucky to survive.