Venerable Church Burns in New Orleans

Newly burned-out lots pockmark the city, evidence of a fearsome new challenge as firefighters here say they are confronting a tough post-Hurricane Katrina landscape of abandoned buildings, water mains cracked by the storm and fire engines with smaller crews.

Historic structures are burning to the ground — the latest was the Coliseum Place Baptist Church, a venerable red brick church that until Friday had towered over Coliseum Square in the Lower Garden District since 1855. Preservationists here described the loss as heartbreaking; it followed a February fire that destroyed a cherished World War I-era theater in the same square.

from the NY Times