Counting the cost of Katrina

HELICOPTERS plucked frantic survivors from rooftops yesterday and officials said hundreds of people may have died in Hurricane Katrina’s attack on the US Gulf Coast, which sent a wall of water into Mississippi and flooded New Orleans.

“The devastation down there is just enormous,” Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour said.

Mr Barbour said there were unconfirmed reports of up to 80 fatalities in the state, including 30 in the city of Biloxi where a beachfront apartment block collapsed.