Tracy Kenerson missed his son Tyler's first birthday on Friday.

At the time, he was inside the Louisiana Superdome hoping his wife and little boy were safe in Orange County, Texas, where they went to wait out Hurricane Katrina.

Kenerson, 38, stayed home to watch over the family's house in downtown New Orleans, sure his family would be back in a few days. Instead, he hasn't spoken to his wife since Sunday morning, the day she left the Kenerson home.

"I wasn't expecting the storm to do what it did," he said. "This one here fooled us."

Kenerson left his home without anything, forced out by rising floodwaters.

"My house overflowed with it, my car, all of that's gone. No more of that," he said.

He spent nearly a full week at the Superdome, time he calls "disastrous."

"There wasn't nothing good at all about it. . . . A lot of killing up in there, a lot of raping. No water, a lot of waste."

He survived by keeping his head low and staying out of the way, sleeping outside for five nights because he figured he'd be safer on the street than inside the giant arena.

He's been in Utah since Saturday and said he hasn't had any problems at Camp Williams. He was finally able to get word to his wife that he was safe, and he said he's not sure what he's going to do now.

"I don't know if I'm going to go back," he said. "I was kind of thinking if I could get her to come here, we'd just stay."