'Katrina babies' describe their ongoing recovery 20 years after deadly storm
Jasmine Batiste celebrated her 9th birthday in 2005, exactly one week before Hurricane Katrina swept through her hometown of New Orleans, Louisiana, leaving her and her family stranded for three days and fearing for their lives.
"The water is at our feet. It's at the bottom of the first step. It's coming in, and I'm just asking my momma, 'Are we going to be OK?' I'm a 9-year-old child. 'Are we going to be OK?'" Batiste recalled of the terrifying moments on Aug. 29, 2005, when Katrina slammed the Gulf Coast as a Category 3 hurricane, becoming one of the five deadliest hurricanes in U.S. history.
Like tens of thousands of people across New Orleans, Batiste and her family were left stranded in their home due to the floodwaters brought by Katrina, the devastation of which is revisited in the ABC News special "Hurricane Katrina: 20 Years After the Storm with Robin Roberts."
Batiste told ABC News that she and her family "lost hope" that they would be rescued until three days after the storm, when they were able to wave down a helicopter.
A then-9-year-old Batiste climbed into a basket lowered down by the helicopter and was carried to safety alongside her mom.
"I'm holding onto my momma and I'm like, 'Man, I don't want the basket to fall. We're slinging over water and roofs right now. Like, this is big,'" she recalled. "I was just so grateful that we had got rescued, and I was just like, what's next? What's life after this?"
Batiste is one of thousands of so-called "Katrina babies," young children whose lives were disrupted due to Katrina, which led to nearly 1,400 deaths and more than $100 billion in damage, according to the National Weather Service.
Tune into "Hurricane Katrina: 20 Years After the Storm with Robin Roberts" on Friday, Aug. 29, at 8 p.m. ET, on ABC. Stream the next day on Disney+ and Hulu for bundle subscribers.
"Everybody who was my age, all the 'Katrina babies,' we went through the same thing, because it was just like, in the twinkle of an eye, our lives changed," said Batiste, now 29.
Two decades after the storm, many "Katrina babies," including New Orleans resident Jeremy Tauriac, are still dealing with the psychological effects of such a massive tragedy.
"We have trauma to heal from. We have wires to untangle mentally," Tauriac told ABC News. "So it's just a lot that you kind of unpack. Me at 31 years old, I'm still unpacking."
Tauriac said he was an 11-year-old elementary school student who was "forced" by Katrina to grow up fast.
He said he was away from his home for one year after the storm, a time he described as "just surviving."
Even when he and his family eventually returned home to New Orleans, it was not a homecoming, he recalled.
"Part of you as a kid gets excited, because you're finally going back home, but then you're also hit with the reality that home is no longer the same anymore the moment that you arrive," Tauriac said. "It smelled different. It smelled like floodwater. It smelled like death. The sensory overload coming back into the city is something that also gets compartmentalized being a child."
He continued, "It's hard to think about what your life is going to look like. All it seems like is that you're having to rebuild the entirety of your life."
Batiste said she too was displaced from her home for a time after Katrina and struggled to find childhood normalcy.
"I didn't want to go to school. My house is not even there. Why do I need to come to school?" she said. "I had no motivation."
Eventually, Batiste said she discovered music, which became her "therapy" and helped give her a purpose.
She remained in New Orleans and is now the assistant band director at a local high school.
"Ever since I was a little girl, I just loved this city and loved everything about it and the people," Batiste said.
Tauriac is also living in New Orleans as a professional photographer, a skill he said he also nurtured while growing up post-Katrina.
"Art was my escape," he said.
Tune into "Hurricane Katrina: 20 Years After the Storm with Robin Roberts" on Friday, Aug. 29, at 8 p.m. ET, on ABC. Stream the next day on Disney+ and Hulu for bundle subscribers.
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