Tornadoes add insult to hurricane's injuries

KENNER, La. -- Tornadoes yesterday tore through New Orleans neighborhoods that had been hit hard by Hurricane Katrina just five months earlier, collapsing at least one previously damaged house and battering the airport, authorities said.

Roofs were ripped off, utility poles came down, and a radio tower fell near a major thoroughfare, but no serious injuries were reported.

''Don't ever ask the question, 'What else could happen?' " said Marcia Paul Leone, a mortgage banker who was surveying the new damage to her home, which had been flooded by Katrina.

Electricity was knocked out for most of the morning at Louis Armstrong International Airport, grounding passenger flights and leaving travelers to wait in a dimly lit terminal powered by generators. The storm also ripped off part of a concourse roof, slammed one jetway into another, and flipped motorized runway luggage carts.

The storm collapsed at least one house on New Orleans's lakefront, police said.

''I cannot believe this. We were hit twice," said Maria Kay Chetta, a city grants manager.