From Superdome to Astrodome: Katrina's refugees will be moved to Houston in bus convoy

NEW ORLEANS — At least 25,000 of Hurricane Katrina's refugees, a majority of them at the New Orleans Superdome, will travel in a bus convoy to Houston and will be sheltered at the Astrodome, which hasn't been used for professional sporting events in years.

Evacuees with special problems already have been evacuated to hospitals in other Louisiana cities, but the 23,000 people now confined to the stuffy, smelly Superdome, as well as some other refugees will go to Houston, about 350 miles away.

The marathon bus convoy should take two days, officials said.

"Our view is the move to the Astrodome is temporary," said William Lokey, chief coordinator for the Federal Emergency Management Agency. "We're buying time until we can figure something out."

Ann Williamson, secretary of the Louisiana Department of Social Services who is working on the evacuation plans, said, "The remarkable offer from Texas did not have an end date."

FEMA will provide 475 buses for the transfer, and the Astrodome's schedule has been cleared through December for housing evacuees, said Kathy Walt, a spokeswoman for Texas Gov. Rick Perry.

The situation inside the dank and sweltering Superdome was becoming desperate: The water was rising, the air conditioning was out, toilets were broken, and tempers were rising.

Word of the move — a logistical nightmare at best — had not reached the Superdome when The Associated Press told administrators about it.

The dome is still surrounded by flooded streets, and getting buses to the ramps will be difficult, if not impossible. The floodwaters are threatening the generators which are providing electricity for the remaining lighting. There has been no air conditioning and only limited lights since city power went out during the hurricane arrived Monday.

National Guardsmen sandbagged a small area around the generator, but the underground fuel tank was covered with water so it could not be refilled until National Guard mechanics and engineers devised a way to bypass the fuel tank and run fuel directly from a truck

"We were down to an hour-and-a-half of fuel." Thornton said.

The generator is now being monitored around the clock. Wednesday morning, it was only 11 1/2 inches above the level of the flood waters.