Officials in New Orleans are belatedly sounding the right tones of toughness against looters and thugs. But on the ground, it’s still FUBAR–and now there are explosions and fires on top of everything else. One local official is begging for gas and buses.

Mayor Ray Nagin says drug addicts are wreaking havoc on the city.

Donald Sensing calls Mayor Nagin’s meltdown a “Kate Hale” moment. Audio here.

New Orleans doctors plead for help:

Doctors at two desperately crippled hospitals in New Orleans called The Associated Press Thursday morning pleading for rescue, saying they were nearly out of food and power and had been forced to move patients to higher floors to escape looters.

“We have been trying to call the mayor’s office, we have been trying to call the governor’s office … we have tried to use any inside pressure we can. We are turning to you. Please help us,” said Dr. Norman McSwain, chief of trauma surgery at Charity Hospital, the larger of two public hospitals.

Charity Hospital is across the street from Tulane University Medical Center, a private facility that has almost completed evacuating more than 1,000 patients and family members, he said.

No such public resources are available for Charity, which has about 250 patients, or University Hospital several blocks away, which has about 110 patients. Tulane’s heliport is available if patients from the public hospitals could be brought there, McSwain said.

“We need coordinated help from the government,” he said.

Late Thursday afternoon, the U.S. Surgeon General’s office told the AP that five private helicopters had been secured to start taking patients out of Charity Hospital. Efforts to get more information from Charity or University hospitals late in the day were unsuccessful because phone lines previously reachable were jammed.

Louisiana blogger Emily Metzgar is trying to spread the word on stranded victims in St. Bernard’s Parish. (Another reminder that it’s not just New Orleans.)

An Australian victim of Katrina tells his countrymen of rape and murder in the Big Easy.

Confusion seems to reign over what the rules of engagement are, reports Brian at Brendan Loy’s blog.

Clayton Cramer continues to document civilian gun defenses in the disaster area.

The American Thinker posts a reflection on “New Orleans hospitality.”

Lance at Red State Rant has a suggestion: Why not used closed BRAC closed bases as temporary shelters?

Hugh Hewitt weighs in on what needs to be done. I hope someone at the White House is reading.