On Saturday afternoon, Sandra Kelly, a 53-year-old cook, stood along the Atchafalaya River, which connects the Mississippi River to the Gulf of Mexico, and sighed. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, manager of much of the nation’s water system, had just opened a spillway north of here, mainly to keep the bloated Mississippi’s waters from toppling levees into cities, particularly the state’s capital, Baton Rouge, and New Orleans. “I don’t know how they decide who to sacrifice,” Kelly said, between slurps of a cherry snowball. “We don’t know what’s going to happen,” she added, “but I’m scared.”
As are many of her neighbors here in Berwick, about a 90-minute drive west of New Orleans. The town lies in the heart of Cajun country, at the base of the Atchafalaya River basin. It’s a key passageway for boats hauling food and other supplies to Louisiana’s offshore oilrigs. So many different stories are circulating through town. There’s talk that residents will have to evacuate
