Letters: A New Orleans Katrina survivor brings plea for climate action to Washington

I’m far from the only New Orleans resident whose entire life was changed by Hurricane Katrina.

This and every other hurricane season brings back haunting memories of the packed interstate on the way to Mississippi, all our neighbors evacuating with us; of the power outages that stretched across state lines; of going from playing volleyball on a Saturday to being forced to move away from everything I’d ever known.

I flew to Washington, D.C., recently to share my survivor’s story at the Museum of Unnatural Disasters, a pop-up exhibit on the National Mall. I wanted to impress upon museum visitors and my members of Congress that we need climate action.

We need a fully funded NOAA and National Weather Service that can predict and prepare us for the next hurricane. We need NWS to provide up-to-the-minute forecasts. And we need FEMA to help us pick up the pieces and begin to recover after the storm.

As climate change fuels stronger hurricanes and other extreme weather, this administration is choosing to attack these lifesaving agencies and roll back climate protections. I went to D.C. to push for climate action. It isn’t a quick or easy fix. But storms like Katrina, Helene, Milton and Debby are only going to get worse if we don’t do something about it.

JESSICA BARNES

New Orleans