New Orleans Police Chief Anne Kirkpatrick promises that “hundreds of officers” will line the city's streets ahead of Thursday's rescheduled Sugar Bowl in the latest security effort following Wednesday's terrorist attack in the French Quarter.
“We are hiring at the same level, if not higher, than what we were preparing for the Super Bowl (in February),” Kirkpatrick told NBC Today.
The College Football Playoff quarterfinals at the Sugar Bowl between Georgia and Notre Dame were postponed a day due to an attack about a mile from the Superdome early Wednesday, when authorities say a truck driver deliberately ran over a New Year's crowd and killed 15 people.
The game, originally scheduled for 7:45 p.m. CST at the 70,000-seat Superdome on Wednesday, was delayed until 3 p.m. on Thursday. The winner advances to the Jan. 9 Orange Bowl against Penn State.
New Orleans City Council Speaker Helena Moreno told WDSU-TV earlier Wednesday, before the postponement was announced, that the security perimeter around the Superdome was being “expanded into a larger area.”
“More police officers are arriving,” he said.
Police vehicles are seen outside the Louisiana Superdome following Wednesday's attack.
New Orleans City Council Speaker Helena Moreno said before the Sugar Bowl postponement that the security perimeter around the Superdome was being “expanded into a larger area.”
The New Orleans casualties occurred when Shamsud-Din Jabbar, a 42-year-old U.S. citizen born and raised in Texas, plowed a pickup truck into a crowd of revelers in New Orleans' famed French Quarter early on New Year's Day. In addition to the dead, more than 30 people were injured.
The driver was killed in a shootout with police after the attack around 3:15 a.m. on Bourbon Street near Canal Street, the FBI said.
Seven victims have now been identified among the 15 innocent people who died in the horrific New Orleans terrorist attack.
A former college football star, a high school senior, a father of two, and a young mother are among the 15 victims who tragically died when Jabbar deliberately ran over pedestrians with an ISIS flag attached to his car.
Tiger Bech, 28, Ni'kyra Cheyenne Dedeaux, 18, Reggie Hunter, 37, Nicole Perez, 27, Matthew Tenedorio, Kareem Badawi and Hubert Gauthreaux, 21, lost their lives in the senseless attack in the early hours of New Year. in the French Quarter.
“Public safety is paramount,” Sugar Bowl CEO Jeff Hundley said at a news conference alongside federal, state and local officials, including Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry and New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell. “All parties agree that postponing the game is in the best interest of everyone and public safety.”
The decision to postpone the game meant that many fans traveling with tickets would not be able to attend. Online ticket prices plummeted in some cases to less than $25 as fans planning to leave on Thursday tried to get rid of them.
“We can't get new flights,” said Lisa Borrelli, a 34-year-old Philadelphia resident who came to New Orleans with her fiancé, a 2011 Notre Dame graduate.
Postponing the game “was absolutely the right decision,” he said. “I completely understand.”
He said they paid more than $250 per ticket and hadn't bothered to put them on sale yet because the prices were so low.
“Of course we're disappointed to miss it and lose so much money, but at the end of the day it doesn't matter,” Borrelli said. “We're lucky we'll be fine.”
U.S. Rep. Troy Carter, D-Louisiana, said the decision to postpone the game “was not made lightly.”
“It was done with one thing in mind: public safety: ensuring that the citizens and visitors of this great city, not just for this event, but for every event they attend in Louisiana, are safe,” Carter added.
Landry said he had a message for those who think, 'Man, do I really want to go to the Sugar Bowl tomorrow?'
“I tell you one thing: Your governor will be there,” Landry said. “That's proof, believe me, that that facility and this city are safer today than they were yesterday.”
FBI agents look at the scene where a man driving a truck killed people in a terrorist attack
Reggie Hunter, 37 years old (left). Nicole Pérez, 27 years old, (right)
Hubert Gauthreaux's family had been frantically sharing posts on social media about his disappearance after the attack, before revealing that he was found dead in a hospital.
Tiger Bech, 28, of Lafayette, Louisiana, died in the New Orleans terrorist attack on Wednesday. He had previously played soccer at Princeton University (right)
Ni'kyra Cheyenne Dedeaux, 18, also lost her life in the attack.
Darrell Huckaby, 72, of Athens, Georgia, also decided to return home Thursday rather than stay to watch the game. He was in a hotel room that overlooked the corner where the attack occurred. He was asleep when it happened, but when he woke up, he could see pink blankets covering the bodies of the dead, and then he saw them being placed in bags and loaded onto trucks bound for the Orleans Parish Coroner's Office.
“It was heartbreaking,” he said. 'I think most people's first instinct this morning was to want to be home. As important as football is to our Georgia culture, for a while the game just didn't seem to matter.
“And I think there was a lot of uncertainty, and I understand that,” Huckaby said. “It took them a long time to decide the timing of the game and people had to make decisions without all the information.”
He added that he would “probably eat” the $360 per ticket he paid.
Hundley said work was being done to “establish a safe, efficient and fun environment” in and around the Superdome on Thursday.
The Superdome was closed for security checks Wednesday morning.
Both teams spent most of the day in their hotels, holding meetings in ballrooms.
Georgia players traveled by bus to the Superdome for a walk-through practice Wednesday night. As they headed to the buses on Canal Street, fans dressed in red and black stood eight to ten behind the barricades, cheering them on, phones held high above their heads to capture the scene.
Shamsud Din Jabbar, 42, drove a white Ford pickup truck into pedestrians advertising 2025 in New Orleans' French Quarter on Wednesday around 3:15 a.m. local time.
Around that time, at a hotel on the banks of the Mississippi River, Notre Dame players gathered with family members in a ballroom where the Rose Bowl quarterfinal game between Ohio State and Oregon was being broadcast on television.
Notre Dame offered band members the option of flying home Thursday instead of attending the game, and some opted to do so.
Georgia President Jere Morehead said the university confirmed that a student was among those seriously injured. Morehead said the university was in contact with the student's family.
Statements from the University of Georgia and Notre Dame Athletic Association said both schools had accounted for all team personnel and members of official travel parties.
The Superdome, which is about 20 blocks away, will also host the Super Bowl on February 9.
The first Super Bowl after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks was also held in New Orleans, and there was a massive security perimeter for that game that included street closures surrounding the Superdome and officers, including snipers, on top of the surrounding skyscrapers. tall buildings, as well as on the roof of the dome itself.
“We are deeply saddened by the news of the devastating incident in New Orleans,” the NFL said in a statement.
“The NFL and the local host committee have been working collaboratively with local, state and federal agencies for the past two years and have developed comprehensive safety plans,” the statement continued. “We are confident that attendees will have a safe and enjoyable experience at the Super Bowl.”