Authorities end search for bodies in Louisiana

updated 6:45 p.m. ET Oct. 3, 2005

NEW ORLEANS - The search for bodies of people killed by Hurricane Katrina has ended in Louisiana, and more searches will be conducted only if someone reports seeing a body, a state official said Monday.

All agencies conducting the searches have finished their sweeps for remains. But Kenyon International Emergency Services, the private company hired by the state to remove the bodies, is on call if any other body is found, said Bob Johannessen, a spokesman with the state Department of Health and Hospitals.

“There might still be bodies found — for instance, if a house was locked and nobody was able to go into it,” Johannessen said.

Last week, the Federal Emergency Management Agency said it had completed its role in the search, because its specialties were no longer needed. Those services include getting to bodies in attics or other hard-to-reach places or in buildings that may be structurally unsound.

FEMA did nearly 23,000 secondary searches in New Orleans with about a dozen teams.

As of Monday, the Katrina death toll in Louisiana stood at 964.

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