The Drive

Since returning home a year ago, I've photographed all the devastated areas of the city. While I was doing so--and it took its toll on me emotionally--I kept wishing I had a good video camera, because it was impossible to capture the extent of the devastation with still photographs. It's one thing to see a ruined house sitting atop a car, the detritus of its owners' private lives spilling onto the pavement, but you cannot understand the palpable presence of destruction unless you've been in a war-torn city, witnessed a tornado destroy a town or simply drive through the post-apocalyptic metropolis and see it. Thank god somebody did exactly that: The Drive is literally a tour (what we call the "devastation tour") of the city as it was the first few months after the storm. I've written before that Lakeview and the Lower Ninth Ward look like post-atomic Hiroshima but without the burn victims. That description is absolutely correct, as any viewing of Japanese film reels will show. Watch The Drive here.