"It's hard to take pictures when you have tears in your eyes." Tim Isbell, September 2005

Covering the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina has been the most difficult assignment in my 20 plus years as a photojournalist. Pictures and words do not do justice to the devastation. I have discovered that to fully appreciate the destructive power of Katrina you must see it for yourself. You must walk the beach and see slabs where homes and businesses once stood. To see the towns of Bay St. Louis and Waveland literally wiped off the map is beyond description.

In all my years as a photographer, my camera has often acted like a shield, but not so with Katrina. I saw horrific sights through my lens. Once I brought the camera down, the horror seemed all the more tangible. During that first week after Katrina, it literally hurt for me to take photos.

Sleeping at home without power or water was another experience. The sound of silence was deafening. If it were not for the multiple helicopters racing back and forth, the vibrant Coast resembled a town of the dead.

I saw people I knew or had come across in doing my job walking around with lifeless stares. These same people who would never ask for any charity were standing in line for hours seeking a morsel of food or bottle of water. My home that was the Mississippi Gulf Coast resembled Beirut or Iraq. Without a doubt, it resembled a war zone. For the Mississippi Gulf Coast, our history begins on Aug. 29, 2005. Much of our history prior to that point was swept away in Katrina.

After the first few weeks following the storm, I quickly grew tired of seeing "damage" pictures. Whenever I saw them, it made me think that Katrina had won the fight. I began concentrating my efforts on showing the resiliency of the Coast. As bad as it might sound, we can become accustomed to the damage and destruction. It is the one thing that is easiest to see right now.

I made it an effort to photograph people who were not going to let Katrina beat them. Through their resiliency, I began to feel good about the place I call home. One of the telling photos from Hurricane Camille was the U. S. flag defiantly flying on a bent flagpole. For me, the picture of Chloe Guice hanging an American flag on a cross amid debris is my defining moment of Hurricane Katrina. It illustrated the Coast's faith in God and Country. With such faith, how could Katrina ever dare to beat us?

Tim Isbell
January 2006

Tim Isbell's Katrina pictures appear in a book titled Hurricane Katrina: Eight Hours that Changed the Mississippi Coast Forever. This book can be purchased at http://www.sunheraldbook.com/.