As part of the usual hurricane preparation drill, Joseph Lasky, M.D.'s lab staff topped off liquid nitrogen tanks and made sure that the breeders of his transgenic mice were safely evacuated before Hurricane Katrina made landfall on Monday, Aug. 29. Immunologist, Esteban Celis, M.D., Ph.D., was not so fortunate. He lost his entire colony of mice, which were housed on the first floor and destroyed by the floods.

Dr. Celis transferred from Mayo to Louisiana State University's Health Sciences Center in New Orleans early in 2005. While at Mayo he initiated three clinical trials to test peptide-based vaccines for cancer. He estimates that his research, already interrupted by his move, will take more than a year to get back on track.

"The biggest challenge will be rebuilding the animal colony," says Dr. Celis. "First we need to reapply for access to the European mouse strain that I need. It takes a lot of time and effort to get the import permits and health certificates. Then we'll have to breed the mice to build the colony back up again."

Dr. Celis assumes that everything was lost. His cells and reagents were stored in freezers that were connected to generators destroyed by the floods.

"We were not prepared for the magnitude of the storm," he says. "We had enough liquid nitrogen to last for one week--but not for a month or more."

Weathering the Storm

As chief of Pulmonary Diseases and Critical Care at Tulane University Health Sciences Center, Dr. Lasky, who remained at the hospital until all of his patients were evacuated, was much more concerned about his patients than his research.

"It was an overwhelming situation but it brought out the incredible resourcefulness and resilience of our staff," says Dr. Lasky. "I had more staff volunteer to stay than I needed and we didn't lose any patients--not even those on ventricular assist devices (artificial heart pumps). Our enterprising engineers found a way to hook them up to generators and we got them out."

A priority for Dr. Lasky, when he returns to New Orleans, is to install an efficient emergency system of communication. Because of the breakdown in communications, Dr. Lasky had to paddle a canoe to check on patients and staff in affiliated and neighboring hospitals. By Thursday, the situation at Charity Hospital was getting desperate and Dr. Lasky paddled to the Louisiana Superdome to persuade authorities to send a small convoy of five-ton trucks to transport the critically ill patients from Charity to the Tulane Saratoga Parking Garage, where they were evacuated with Blackhawk helicopters.

Lack of communication also meant the hospital staff and patients did not see the horrific scenes broadcast to the rest of the nation. Nevertheless, Dr. Lasky was aware of one problem.

"On one of my forays I waded through the sludge to get to dry land and then ran passed people wheeling shopping carts full of cigarette cartons on St. Charles Avenue," says Dr. Lasky. "But I never felt threatened. We could also see some of the looting on Canal Street from the hospital parking garage rooftop that we used as a makeshift heliport."

After almost a week of working, living and sleeping in the hospital, Dr. Lasky was among the 300 health care providers and support staff who slept on the floor of the parking garage waiting for the next day's evacuation.

"With the patients all evacuated, the staff got up in the morning and cleared every last piece of trash from the parking garage," says Dr. Lasky. "That was typical of how everyone stepped up and went beyond just doing their jobs."

Between taking care of patients, Dr. Lasky made infrequent trips to his lab to care for his lab animals. However, at the time of this writing, it has been more than five weeks since Hurricane Katrina and Dr. Lasky has not yet been able to assess the damage to his research projects.

"I know we lost some reagents and samples from experiments," says Dr. Lasky. "But I won't know the extent of it until I can get into the building. However, I feel very fortunate. My family is safe, my house is not too badly damaged, the NIH (National Institutes of Health) has been very supportive in providing resources and additional time to complete the projects that they are funding. And Mayo has been very kind too."

Mayo Supports Its Displaced Alumni

Mayo has provided a visiting scientist appointment for Dr. Lasky who completed his internal medicine residence here in 1988. He is currently collaborating with Mayo pulmonologists Andrew Limper, M.D., and Craig Daniels, M.D., on a clinical trial to test a new drug for idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis.

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"I have office space and computer access and they have even allowed me to set up some experiments," says Dr. Lasky. "But my priority is in rebuilding our programs and taking care of our pulmonary fellows and staff who are scattered in various other medical centers. I go back and forth to New Orleans every week and have focused on the needs of our patients and on our ongoing clinical trials, so I haven't had time to set up bench experiments."

Dr. Celis appreciates similar help from Mayo. He has some lab space and the two post-doctoral students who came with him are trying to recuperate cells that can be stored at Mayo until the lab is ready to move back to LSU. He continues his collaboration on prostate cancer research with Donald Tindall, Ph.D., on a Specialized Program of Research Excellence (SPORE) grant.

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The first floor of Dr. Celis's house in New Orleans was entirely flooded but he is able to live on the second floor when he visits. In an odd twist of fate, his house in Rochester, Minn., had not sold, so at least he and his family had somewhere to go.

"My son was only in school in New Orleans for three days," says Dr. Celis. "Now he's back at his old high school--it's his junior year and we think it best for him to finish the year, and maybe his senior year too. But that means I'll be separated from my family for the next two years."

Dr. Lasky anticipates returning to New Orleans in early November. Tulane University hopes to reopen in January. Dr. Celis anticipates being able to get into his lab by the end of October but is uncertain when he will be able to move back permanently.