First body sweep eases 'dire' fears 10,000 died

AUTHORITIES yesterday said their first systematic sweep of New Orleans found far fewer bodies than expected, suggesting that Hurricane Katrina's death toll may not be the catastrophic 10,000 feared.

"I think there's some encouragement in what we've found in the initial sweeps that some of the catastrophic deaths that some people predicted may not have occurred," said Terry Ebbert, New Orleans homeland security chief.

He declined to give a new estimate of the dead.