Posted: 4:12 p.m. ET
CNN's Jeanne Meserve in Baton Rouge, Louisiana
On the way out of New Orleans, it looked like the dust bowl. You've seen the pictures of the dust bowl, of people piled onto the backs of tracks and moving their lives. That's what is happening here. It's extraordinary to witness.
I truly believe that apart from 9/11 this is one of the most significant events that has ever hit this country. Anybody who tells you this disaster is going to be rectified in a matter of months hasn't seen the situation.
People are carrying their children, trying to get them to safety. A woman coming down to the police, close to hysterics, saying, "My elderly mother is in a building over there, she needs dialysis. She can't get it. She is dying. Can you help me?"
And the police had to say, "There is absolutely nothing we can do. We don't have a precinct house. We don't have communication. There is absolutely nothing we can do for you." (Watch the video report on the pregnant woman who swam for help for her asthmatic son 2:21)
That was amazing to me.
