It is much tougher for the outer parishes. Doran receives handwritten messages from several parish officials that had been driven to Baton Rouge because they have no other way to reach him. Someone drives all the way in from nearby Washington Parish with a note listing all the immediate needs, warning that one of their towns is totally wiped out.
"It was like using carrier pigeons," says Doran.
At one point, Doran is able to get in touch with hard-hit St. Bernard Parish, next to New Orleans, which is almost entirely cut off from the outside world. His friend Ingargiola is on the line. Emergency manager Ingargiola's wife, a nurse, is worried about a woman in one of their hospitals who'd had surgery the night before and is hemorrhaging. The situation is critical.
But the flooding has isolated the parish–all the roads are blocked. The docks are too damaged to use.
"They were an island," says Doran. He quickly secures a helicopter with a rescue basket. But he also needs to find a hospital with electric power, the proper equipment and doctors to care for her, and a helipad.
Eventually, he is able to send her to Baton Rouge General Hospital. Remarkably, she survives.
Next: For outlying parishes, help is scant; in the city, the Superdome and convention center are overwhelmed.
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