Lights and smoke at Port Fourchon, two years after the Macondo oil well blow out and subsequent six-month ban on deepwater drilling in the Gulf of Mexico.
The port, located at the state’s southernmost habitable tip, is considered the epicenter for oil and gas production in the Gulf of Mexico.
The sprawling, 1,700 -acre port is home to 250 companies. It serves as a throughway for more than 15 percent of the nation’s oil supply, according to the Greater Lafourche Port Commission. The port is estimated to generate $4 million in business sales and $950,000 in household earnings throughout south Louisiana.
And about 2,505 workers in the state were let go as a result of the ban, according to a state tally last year of people who filed for unemployment and checked a box saying the drilling moratorium had left them jobless.
More in the article by Cara Bayles.
Adrian Bourgeois, 22, an accounting student at Nicholls State University, is a fast talking, ambitious young person. He has a way of getting you wrapped in a conversation simply through the sound of his voice.
Even though I witnessed all of this, I was still surprised by the abilities he showed when I recorded his poetry from his book, “Message to the Masses,” specifically, the poem “Clowns and Cockroaches.”
I made this the central part of the video I shot because frankly, reading the poems to yourself does not do them justice.
“I told him if he writes another one to make it an audio book,” Matherne said. “It’s so much better when he reads the poems in person.”
Read more in the article by Nate Monroe.
Neighborhood friends, from left, Jacob Luke, 7, Lawrence Bertoniere,7, and his sister, Megan Bertoniere, 12 pause while playing on Avet Street on Thursday in Dulac, Louisiana.
The mother of one of the friends, who isn’t pictured, approached me to ask the obvious questions relating to strangers and cameras and children. After I had dissuaded her understandable concerns, her tone shifted to curiosity in the article I was photographing for.
The 2012 Louisiana Plan for Coastal Restoration had been released, and outlined where the state was putting its financial resources towards protecting. Most striking was the map found on page 15 of the report, showing the extent of coastal land loss predicted over the next 50 years if nothing was done. The sad thing is, the corresponding map of things planned to help rebuild and defend the coastline, show that more emphasis is being placed on rescuing the area immediate to New Orleans.
The plan proposes significant water diversions and marsh-creation projects around the Mississippi and Atchafalaya rivers. But due to the high cost and difficulty, fewer restoration projects made the cut for the most-vulnerable and rapidly eroding areas in Terrebonne and Lafourche.
Many local coastal advocates expressed disappointment in the plan and emphasized that it is more important than ever for residents to get involved and give their input to the state.
Read more in this article by Nikki Buskey.
So the mother waited patiently for my answer, and I racked my brain to remember the particulars of the plan, and why I had come all the way down to Dulac to, “y’know… put a human face on a story involving a lot of maps and numbers.”
Her home, adorned with a brilliant white and black and gold sign reading, “Saints Fans Only,” would be under a few feet of water by the end of the century. Even if all of the things they are planning to do to save the coast were implemented and worked, her home would still be gone.
“It’s pretty bleak,” I stammered, as I tried to explain the different things they were doing in the surrounding parishes, even recreating the barrier islands that had been destroyed by erosion.
She cut me off there, with a smile. This was something she was used to hearing, and I wasn’t telling her anything new. After federal plans, and now statewide plans for salvation had fallen through, it was expected that she would have to do like 40% of Dulac residents had done before her, and move.
A Gulf Fritillary on Bayou Lafourche.
Prayer over graduates at Nicholls State University.
Meet Dylan Danos. Danos suffers from cystic fibrosis, a genetic disease that primarily affects the lungs, among other symptoms.
Danos survived a double lung transplant, only to return to the swimming pool almost four months later, to swim the 50 yard freestyle event for the South Lafourche High School swim team.
Read more about Danos on Houmatoday.com.
Jared Matherne lies on the grass exhausted after a race; Thibodaux High School runners cheer before the start of the district 7-5A cross country meet; runners from H.L. Bourgeois High School pass the Raceland Sugar Mill; and Garrett Thibodeaux of Terrebonne High School rests on the grass.
