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Category 5: The Story of Camille, Lessons Unlearned from America's Most Violent Hurricane

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"Category 5" by Ernest Zebrowski and Judith A. Howard is one of the most absorbing books I have read on any topic during several decades of avid reading. The writing style and organization are superb, and the book reads like a smash adventure/mystery novel as it describes the all too real fury of Hurricane Camille of 1969.

The authors focus on the exciting (and often tragic) stories of individual people fighting for survival during Camille's onslaught. You can feel the water sloshing over you as you try to stay afloat on a small piece of what used to be your house, while brushing poisonous snakes off you as they compete for anything that will float. You feel the helpless rage of competent local officials in the aftermath of Camille as they encounter the stupidity of "outsiders" from the Federal Government. You smell the sweat and fear, see the pain and frustration, and taste the admixture of bravery and cowardice, brilliance and silliness, that always mark human behavior when a natural disaster strikes.

And, although "Category 5" was not written with Katrina in mind, you cannot help but see some startling parallels bewteen these two Evil Sisters, and to wonder whether we ever will learn and remember the proper lessons from natural disasters.

The nature, behavior, and effects of hurricanes are mysteries to most people, and it is natural to wonder how and why they do what they do. The authors recognize this curiosity, and provide some very clear explanations of how natural forces act to form and direct hurricanes and cause them to inflict immense damage. As I read these easily visualized explanations, I found myself saying "OK, now I see what a storm surge really is and how it forms", and "WHAT? I never would have believed a large river could flow backwards, but now I see how that can - and did - happen during Camille", and "Wow, now I understand why floodwaters are a lot more damaging than I had supposed!", and "Gee, no wonder Katrina was much easier to track than Camille, those guys in 1969 had to do a lot of 'guessing' with the primitive technology of that time". The science is presented smoothly and clearly, and there is no dreaded math to make the reader scratch his/her head and let loose an expletive or two.

Very early in the book we read a fascinating discussion of a "Southern Gentleman(?)" named Leander Perez as he applies, probably unknowingly, the principles of Machiavelli to become the political dictator of Plaquemine Parish in Louisiana. At first I wondered what this "historical political excursion" had to do with Camille, but I quickly realized that Zebrowski and Howard are giving us a fascinating, and disturbing, glimpse into Old Time Politics and its effect on the response to a natural disaster. (Does the reader need to ask how this becomes pertinent to the 2005 Katrina catastrophe?)

The authors brilliantly weave together the complex interactions of numerous individuals and organizations, good, bad, or indifferent, to produce an excellently written tapestry of the Camille disaster. In my opinion, this book should be made into a Hollywood movie - but under the tight control of Zebrowski and Howard!

"Category 5" by Ernest Zebrowski and Judith A. Howard looks at the greatest storm to strike the Gulf Coast of the United States. No, this is not a rushed book to chronicle the ravages of Hurricane Katrina, but the eerily similar story of Hurricane Camille, which also struck near the mouth of the Mississippi River in August 1969. The authors subtitled their book "Lessons Unlearned from America's Most Violent Hurricane" for now too obvious reasons.

Hurricane Camille struck the Gulf Coast as an acknowledged Category 5 hurricane. Its winds reached nearly 200 mile per hour winds and pushed a 28-foot storm surge onto Pass Christian and Biloxi, Mississippi. Camille's track before and after landfall was quite different from Katrina's; however, both storms struck the Louisiana-Mississippi coast around the mouth of the Great River. Whereas Katrina's big story was the resultant flooding of New Orleans, Camille struck the region with an incredible storm surge and then moved on to dump massive rains across Virginia.

Authors Zebrowski and Howard not only tell the tale of the storm and its fury but weave the story within the context of the local history of storms, politics, state's rights and, at the time, civil rights battles. Like Katrina, Camille had an understory of particularly hard impacts on the poor. The authors focus their coverage on the plights of a few individuals and families whose stories enhance and typify the human disaster unfolding in the three hard hit regions. The story also relates the civil defence efforts to evacuate residents in the storm's path.

The book's greatest value is the placing of the events into a view of how America responded and should respond to natural disasters. Zebrowski and Howard discuss what should have been learned from the storm, lessons that should stand out in "bold type" and "red pen" given the experiences of Katrina. It is of note that this book was scheduled for a much later release, but it publication was pushed forward in response to the Katrina disaster. Despite the short time frame, the book does include references and comments on Katrina's impact with regard to Camille, though the authors have been wise to purposely limit their analysis of the Katrina response.

I found this book a very well-written and balanced account of the storm and the circumstances surrounding it. In my view, it provides a good example of what the genre of natural disaster books should be. I think this arises from the fact that the authors have strong credentials in areas other than history. Ernest Zebrowski, PhD, a former professor, authored "Perils of a Restless Planet: Scientific Perspectives on Natural Disasters". Judith Howard holds a PhD in clinical social work from UCLA with further training in disaster psychology, and currently is a clinical social worker with a psychotherapy practice in Ruston, Louisiana.

I place "Category 5: The Story of Camille, Lessons Unlearned from America's Most Violent Hurricane" on my must read list. It has appeals on many levels but should be mandatory reading for anyone interested in emergency response to natural disasters.

This book, the story of 1969's Hurricane Camille, is a breezy (yes, that word APPLIES) read which interweaves several plotlines -- the powerful force of a Cat 5 hurricane, the lives it touched and the tragedies which occurred, the will to survive, the peculiar and corrupt qualities of Louisiana politics, the ongoing civil rights movement of the time, and the surprisingly primitive nature of weather forecasting in the late 1960's.
As a person who once moved out of a city in part due to the fact that the local cable company DIDN'T carry The Weather Channel, I expected to enjoy the stormy aspects of the book. I did not expect the history and politics of the time to carry this story down unexpected avenues. It was a pleasant surprise.
I recommend it without hesitation.

The Zebrowski and Howard exposition of the Category 5 Hurricane Camille reads like a gripping novel, and--at times--has the intrigue of a murder mystery set in the rural South. Their portrayal of the human drama, relationships, and psychology of the protagonists, coupled with the immensely clear and accessible scientific explanations of the events, make it appealing to a wide audience. It's beautifully written; it's a must read.

The authors of this book were putting the finishing touches on it when Katrina made landfall in generally the same area as Camille. They went back and added a chapter but for the most part the book was left to stand on its own in light of the more recent disaster and it stood up quite well. All through the book there are obvious parallels between the two storms and especially the response that came in their aftermath. It is to be hoped that government officials took the lessons of Katrina to heart in a much more effective way than they did the lessons of Camille and that when the next major hurricane devastates a costal area the outside response will be far more effective.

One of the few things that did improve in the years between the hurricanes was the ability of forecasters to predict the track of the storm and to get the word out. In 1969 radar tracking and computer models were in their infancy and up until shortly before landfall forecasters were sure that Camille would strike Florida. Once they did realize that it was headed for Mississippi they had trouble getting the word out and had it not been for the foresight of local officials the death toll would have been much higher. These authors take the meteorological aspects of this story and present them in a remarkably easy to understand way and do so to the extent that the reader will almost be able to feel the angst of forecasters as they try to figure out just what Camille is up to. These Hurricane Center people are remarkable.

These authors do an excellent job of relating how local authorities had taken to heart the lessons learned from hurricane Audrey in 1957 and the precautions that they had taken because of those lessons. It is not hard to see in this narrative that state and federal authorities were far behind the local authorities in preparedness for Camille and that the same was true all those years later when Katrina came ashore. This is not however just a story about the failure of government though, it is also very much a story of the people who were the victims of this great storm. This is a story of the heroism of and resilience of people who were hit with the worst that nature has to offer.

These authors do a marvelous job of relating the stories of individuals and families who were in the path of the monster Camille. Through the reminiscences of those who survived the authors tell the stories of families ripped apart and of whole families who just vanished. They tell the true story of the much publicized collapse of the Richelieu apartments in Pass Christian, they tell the story of a group of men out for a sail who end up weathering the storm near the mouth of the Mississippi as their boat breaks up around them, they tell the story of people who sought refuge in local churches only to find the large old building disintegrating around them and they tell the story of quiet communities in Virginia where the people went to bed with no warning at all that many of them would be washed away before dawn. Through it all the survivors immediately turned their attention toward helping each other once the storm had passed and these survivors, many of them wounded or in mourning themselves immediately began rescue efforts that saved untold numbers of people. It is the heart and soul of these people that is the true story to be found in this book and these authors have truly done these people justice in this highly readable account of one of the great disasters in American history.

Once you pick this book up, you won't want to put it down until you've read the very last page and the dust cover notes as well. As a reader all too familiar with the wrath and destruction of hurricanes, I found the historical facts eerily accurate and the human drama so tense that the reader is drawn into the story as if sucked into the vortex of the storm itself. Category 5 is gripping and powerful like a well-written novel and not the true account of devastation and suffering that it is -- without the dry, clinical approach of a mere assessment of storm damage. The human element is often invisible when looking at the overall picture. Howard and Zebrowski take us to ground zero to examine the personal lives of those affected and no reader can ever put those images out of his or her mind. Excellent read!

Tom Aswell
Baton Rouge, LA.

Longtime residents of Mississippi always refer to any event or experience in their lives with one of two decisive descriptions,"before Camille or after Camille".
Rightfully so,Camille crossed the coast on August 17,1969 with
her 200 mph winds and 28 ft. storm surge and forever changed the way this nation views hurricanes.
Howard and Zebrowski have stepped up to the plate to provide
a very well written account of the infamous Camille.Compared to
the recent book written by Phillip D. Hearn on the storm in 2004,Category 5 reads like a masterpiece on the subject.
The text only gets more compelling as you read,and they give excellent coverage of what her victims had to endure during and after the hurricane.
Camille left an indelible mark on society,and this book is good proof of that fact.It is a must-have for any weather enthusiast.

On August 17, 1969 that's what happened. Hurricane Camille, with sustained winds over 170 m.p.h., stirred the waters of the Gulf of Mexico with such fury the Old Man was forced to swallow his own flow and roll along backwards. The Category 5 Hurricane next quenched her thirst with a 240 sq. mile lake. In one deep inhalation she suctioned all liquid from Lake Borgne, leaving behind a bewildered crew wading away from its stuck-in-the-muck schooner.

Only two of the amazing events surrounding the arrival of Camille chronicled in Category 5 The Story of Camille. Through poignant stories of survivors authors Judith Howard and Ernest Zebrowski have interspersed scientific facts explained in ordinary terms, an entertaining history of the crooked politics in Louisana and a detailed account of the painstaking reconstruction. This work of non-ficition reads with the intensity of a thriller! An added plus are the many photos and maps that track Camille's path of terror and lift the reader along.

Loved this book and learned alot! The story of Camille is a fine read on its own, but is especially important in the aftermath of Katrina. Though the book was written before Katrina, it details the safeguards that were developed after Camille to ensure prompt action in the event of a future disaster. HELLO?

"Category 5" is excellent reading. The plot, with many interesting facts, keeps the reader spellbound. It is difficult to stop reading once you start! Many long hours of research had to be done for this fact filled book. The racial feelings in Louisanna, corupt polititions, and the "state of the art" science of 1969, all combine to make this book all come together for one of the best books I have ever read!

What a wonderful read Category 5 was. I am a voracious reader, but, unfortunately, a slow one (and people say God doesn't have a sense of humor), but I picked up a hardback copy of of Category 5 two days ago and finished it 5am this morning--I couldn't put it down. I love how the authors wove the stories of the people in with the unfolding science. In particular, I had a lump in my throat when I read how Luke Petrovich went to his grave still thinking he hadn't done enough. He seemed like a fine man, and a remarkable one, considering how he crawled out from under the mental and emotional and psychological clutches of the "Judge". I live right here in central Virginia (Greene County, just north of Charlottesville), and I have a friend in Nelson County, so I've been passing to and through that county for years, and I had always heard about the horrible events wrought when Camille came to visit that August night, but this narrative brought it alive and made it all real. Also, I have to admit, I never truly before understood what all the ire and lingering mistrust was about on the part of African Americans, but the discussions of the pervasive and unrelenting bigotry of the time and place opened my eyes--I'd be angry, too, to this day if I and people like me, simply because of the color of our skins, had endured THAT degree of hatred. More than once while I was reading, I had to put the book down and just breathe a long, "My God!" I wonnder if the authors have thought about selling the movie rights to Category 5. Many times while I was reading, I thought about what a great movie this book would make--heck, the part about the "Judge" alone would make for great viewing!--what a despicable, yet multifaceted and multilayered man! Look at what Petersen and company did with The Perfect Storm--a movie from Category 5 would be ten times better (if it copied the quality of the book, that is). I recommend this book highly for a thought-provoking, eye-opening, page-turning read.