New Orleans (NO Levee) - A recently repaved stretch of Cadiz Street in Uptown has resulted in 13 deaths, 10 from local drivers caught off-guard by a smooth road and three from shock over a New Orleans street being repaved. Numerous people have been injured.

Mayor Ray Nagin immediately ordered police to begin investigating who repaved the street between Magazine and Tchoupitoulas streets and called upon Crimestoppers to offer a reward.

“We can’t have rogue progress being made upon our citizens at this tipping point of ongoing planning for our recovery,” the mayor said. “I am calling on whoever repaved this street to rip it up and return it to its previous moonscape.”

Witnesses say the feet of drivers turning onto a smooth Cadiz may have accidentally slipped off their brake pedals and onto their accelerators because they were expecting huge holes that were no longer there.
“I know myself I lost control and swerved over grass and just missed two cars, a house and three kids,” resident Lee Mulken said.

“I turned onto the street and, as usual, braced my body for the shock of the car jerking back and forth and bottoming out,” he said. “Three blocks later it was still smooth and I panicked. I went to jam on my brake, but I hit the gas and I couldn’t stop screaming. I thought I was going to die.”

Mulken said he was saved when all four of his car’s wheels fell off, apparently from the vehicle being in as much shock as the driver, and the car screeched to a halt just feet from striking three stunned children.

“We’re seein’ it more lately,” local mechanic Frank Jojeaux said of vehicles in New Orleans reacting to changes in road conditions just like drivers. “It works like how the car gets you to home after you been drinkin’ all night. They know.”

Mulken, however, was fortunate. Ten other locals have lost their lives on the smooth road, including a pair of paramedics who were responding to one of the fatal crashes.

Three residents were so shocked to see a repaving happening they dropped dead on the spot, officials said.

Police said they received several calls, apparently while the roadwork was going on, charging that vandals were trying to steal Cadiz Street. Police Superintendent Warren Riley said a check of a nearby crime camera showed nothing out of the ordinary.

“It wasn’t working,” he said. “Based upon that information, we considered the case successfully closed.”

Crimestoppers Executive Director Darlene Cusanza said a $1,500 reward would be issued in the Cadiz Street case, but held out hope that it was the city that had repaved the road.

“Nah,” she then said. “We’ll get ’em.”

The New Orleans Levee, Rudy M. Vorkapic