In the aftermath of the levee failures during Hurricane Katrina in 2005, many people took refuge from the flooding atop the bridge, and people from the severely flooded Lower Ninth Ward used it to get to the dry, high ground near the river on the upriver side of the bridge.
After Hurricane Katrina's catastrophic impact in 2005, people fled to the bridge to avoid the floodwaters, and residents from the devastated Lower Ninth Ward used the bridge as a route to safer high ground adjacent to the river on the opposite side.