Violet couple pitched a tent in their Katrina-flooded home

VIOLET, La. (WGNO) — When Katrina’s floodwaters rushed through the front door of their single-story brick home, Charlene and Wayne Conrad ran out the back door and wound up clinging to their picnic table as it floated down the street.

That was the start of a cross-country odyssey on Aug. 29, 2005, that took the Conrads from their neighborhood in St. Bernard Parish to the Astrodome in Houston, where a security guard refused to let evacuees get off the bus, and then on to stops in Tennessee and Virginia until they finally got back to Violet.

That was in early November of 2005, and the Conrads didn’t get a FEMA trailer on their property until the following March.

What the Conrads did get, was some money from the Red Cross or the Salvation Army, they can’t remember which, but just enough to buy a 9×9 foot tent. A nice, green tent that fit perfectly in the space in their gutted house that used to be the living room.

And that’s where they stayed, in that “home” within their home, for four months.

What was that post-Katrina life like for the Conrads? Watch Susan Roesgen’s story above.

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