Hurricane recovery to take years, says Bush

WASHINGTON - US President George W Bush says it will take years for the country's Gulf Coast states to fully recover from the destruction caused by Hurricane Katrina.

More than 78,000 people are now in shelters after the hurricane that struck on Monday Bush said, calling it "one of the worst natural disasters in our nation's history."

He said "tens of thousands of homes and businesses are beyond repair" and that part of the Mississippi Gulf Coast has been "completely destroyed."

"This recovery will take a long time. This recovery will take years," he said.

Bush, who returned to the White House from his month-long Texas vacation to oversee the recovery efforts, promised a massive recovery effort but did not estimate how much it would cost.

"There's a lot of work we're going to have to do," he said. "This is going to be a difficult road. The challenges that we face on the ground are unprecedented."

Meanwhile, in Biloxi, Mississippi, the devastated streets and on top of the rubble piles where their homes once stood, a bitter refrain is increasingly heard from poor and low-income residents who complain that they have borne the brunt of the hurricane's wrath.

"Many people didn't have the financial means to get out," said Alan LeBreton, 41, an apartment superintendent who lived on Biloxi's seaside road, now in ruins. "That's a crime and people are angry about it."

Many of the town's well-off heeded authorities' warnings to flee north, joining thousands of others who travelled from the Gulf Coast into northern Mississippi and Alabama, Georgia and other nearby states.

Hotels along the interstates and other main roads were packed with these temporary refugees. Gas stations and convenience stores -- at least those that were open -- sold out of water, ice and other supplies within hours.

But others could not afford to join them, either because they didn't own a car or couldn't raise funds for even the cheapest motel.

"No way we could do that," said Willie Rhetta, a bus driver, who remained in his home to await Katrina.

Resentment at being left behind in the path of one of the fiercest hurricanes on record may have contributed to some of the looting that occurred in Biloxi and other coastal communities.

Several private residences, including some in upscale neighbourhoods, were targeted, residents said.

Biloxi experienced an economic boom when casinos were legalised in the early 1990s but class divisions, which often fall along racial lines in this once-segregated southern state, are not new to Mississippi. It traditionally is one of the poorest states in the United States.

In 2004, Mississippi had the second lowest median household income and the highest percentage of people -- 21.6 per cent -- living in poverty, according to a report released this week by the US Census Bureau.

- REUTERS