You pay your taxes, he thought, and you assume the government will take care of you in a disaster. Panicked and convinced he would die, he reached his family by cell phone to say good-bye. He lost his footing in an inky stairwell and nearly pitched down the concrete steps before catching himself. Thiele thought the hospital would be overtaken, that those inside it had no good way to defend themselves. "The enemy" lurked as near as a credit union building across the street. He was sure people were trying to kill each other. Wednesday night, Thiele heard gunshots outside the hospital. He said he was no longer caring for patients and too busy to worry about what was going on inside the hospital. Kokemor would later say he never made the gesture, that he had spent nearly all his time outside the building loading hundreds of mostly able-bodied evacuees onto boats, which floated them over a dozen blocks of flooded streets to where they could wade to dry ground. "Man, I hope we don't come to that," Thiele said. When Thiele asked why, his friend brought an index finger to the crook of his opposite elbow and pantomimed giving an injection.
John Kokemor, who told him doctors were being requested to leave last. That afternoon, Thiele sat on the emergency room ramp for a cigar break with an internist, Dr. Volunteers helped heft patients to staging areas for rescue, but helicopters arrived irregularly.
On Tuesday, the floodwaters rose.Įarly Wednesday morning, Memorial's generators failed, throwing the hospital into darkness and cutting off power to the machines that supported patients' lives. The well-insulated hospital turned dank and humid Thiele noticed water dripping down its walls.
The hospital's backup generators did not support air-conditioning, and the temperature climbed.