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Dave Martin / AP
A leafless tree stands over graves in the Cheniere Caminada cemetery in Grand Isle, La. Many coastal Louisiana cemeteries are just skeletons of what they used to be.
The Associated Press reports from Leeville, La. — As a young adult, Kathleen Cheramie visited her grandmother's grave in a tree-lined cemetery where white concrete crosses dotted a plot of lush green grass just off Louisiana Highway 1.
Now, the cemetery in Leeville is a skeleton of its former self. The few trees still standing have been killed by saltwater intruding from the Gulf. Their leafless branches are suspended above marsh grass left brown and soggy from saltwater creeping up from beneath the graves.
"It was a beautiful place to visit," said Cheramie, 67, who lives in nearby Golden Meadow. "It hurts to see it now."
Dave Martin / AP
What's left of the old Leeville cemetery is only accessible by boat. Some headstones are barely visible above the water, and waves lap at the bricks and concrete surrounding caskets buried at the site since the late 1800s. Much of the ground has subsided to barely sea level, and during Hurricane Isaac, about seven feet of land washed away in the tidal surge.
Cheramie's small family graveyard is among at least two dozen cemeteries across the southeast Louisiana coast that are rapidly sinking or washing away because of erosion and subsidence accelerated by the tropical punch of storms such as Katrina, Rita, Gustav, Ike, Lee and Isaac.
Slideshow: Isaac makes landfall on the US Gulf Coast
Coastal Louisiana has lost about 1,900 square miles of land since the 1930s as canals dug for oil exploration allowed salty water to intrude into marshes and a succession of powerful hurricanes sucked marsh muck that protects populated areas out into the Gulf.
Dave Martin / AP
Windell Curole handles pieces of headstone at his small family cemetery which sits along the bayou near Leeville. Curole said saltwater from the Gulf is causing a crippling subsidence problem.
South Lafourche Levee District General Manager Windell Curole, who also serves on the state's Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority, said saltwater from the Gulf is causing a crippling subsidence problem.
"We did not bury people in marshes," Curole said. "We buried them on high ground. This was high ground, and now it's subsided to the point of being wetlands and open water." Read the full story.
Editor's note: Images taken on Dec. 29, 2012 and made available to NBC News today.
Dave Martin / AP
Water washes around and against the tombs of those buried in a Leeville, La., cemetery.
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So, how much pork is in this bill we are going to pass?
Yes...Let's spend even more money on an area that is BELOW sea level. I do believe if you want to live in an area that is below sea level, the risks are all yours.
A mere 5000 years ago our southwestern deserts were lush, watered, overgrown with palms. I demand to know whose fault it is! Maybe it's a CAPITALIST trying to figure out how to make people's lives better; maybe it's a CORPORATION employing thousands of people providing goods and services that people want or need; maybe it's a CONSERVATIVE with (hyuck hyuck) beliefs in right and wrong. Oh I'm so hysterical my panties are damp.
Just implement a democratic party cemetry tax or better yet borrow some more money. Problem solved.
what does gov.jingles have to say about the dead?(and your love becomes a funeral pyre)
So don't be surprised if ya come across a few more body parts than usual floating around in the Gulf of Mexico!
people vs nature
what side are you on?
The levees dont fail, the idea of levee is the failure
Hey Mike come n baby light my fire.
and to the one worried about bodies contaminating the water....I think the oil took care of that
It is how mother nature keeps things cleaned up!
Critical times hard to deal with, will be here.
In 1896 (check the records) The City of New Orleans and surrounding areas was 6 ft above sea level...6 ft. You people who claim that Govt should do something..Hooooorah....Move every damn person off the coastal areas of LA,,FL..NC,,SC,,MS...AL...and so on. We allow people to build and buy,,because...awwww it it sooooo pretty...until it gets wiped out. This is idiocy on the highest order.....STOP letting people live and build in coastal areas..PERIOD. ARTICLE: This was high ground when we buried them,,,has anybody ever heard of mother nature? You, the Army corps and the Great state, can't stop the forces of nature. Katrina..BAMMMMM,,and then we rebuild so fools can move right back in....The next one BAMMMMM...and we start all over again!
Consider how many billions of people have been buried since mankind began eons of time ago without headstones,caskets,etc or any record of they having been here,unless they were linked to royalty? God still knows who they are and cares.
More levy's! Save our dead.
This may only mean something to the families, but I am a photographer and took several photos of this sacred ground in Leeville a few years back. Believe me it did not look like this. I would be happy and willing to share those photographs of the toomstones and sacred statues i saw there. It was a stormy day and I was almost struck by lightning getting out of the car to take the photos, but I felt compelled, as it was a poswerful place. My heartfelt sympathies to those dealing with this sad and tragic situation.
If rain can reduce mountain ranges to sand then surely the ocean can reshape a coastline over a much shorter period.
This did not happen over night. The earth did not open up in one fell swoop and suck up a burial location. If anyone really cared they would have done something years agon when the situation was visual and possible moving was possible. To hear political leaders say "it is so very sad" is just anohter relelrct me waste of oxygen.
Do something before it is roo late leaders-not always say how sad it is after the fact. Guess however the later does protect the purse strings
Cemeteries are a HUGE waste of real estate. When some1 dies, just throw the carcass in a lake or river and feed the fish.
Or better yet just throw the cadaver to the curb so the vultures and dogs can have a free meal.
Do folks really believe they didn't know about this risk 150 years ago? I wonder why most all the graves in the region are above ground in concrete boxes. Louisiana IS the Miss River Delta and the region was artificially pumped 200+ years ago. Situation is horrific, but not surprising. Canaling, Levies, rising sea level, and storms will eventually overtake the state. Maybe someday we'll have ocean front property in MO!! So agree with the Cremation comments. My home city has moved the same cemetery twice in the last 12 years as we continue to grow south at taxpayers expense and I'm sure it wont be the last time. Sorry to those in the areas dealing with this, my comments are not meant to be insensitive.
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everybody's an expert