Editor’s note: Mississippi Today Ideas is publishing guest essays from people impacted by Hurricane Katrina during the week of the 20th anniversary of the storm that hit the Mississippi Gulf Coast on Aug. 29, 2005.

As I flew home from a three-week economic development trip to Japan on Aug. 24th, 2005, I became aware that a tropical storm was in the Atlantic headed toward Florida. That day it was named Hurricane Katrina by the National Hurricane Center.

It hit southeastern Florida as a Category 1 hurricane on the 25th and then traveled into the warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico that evening.

After Hurricane Camille hit Mississippi’s Gulf Coast in 1969, the state had conducted annual drills and practice sessions in preparation for the next major hurricane. Based on those preparations and

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