On a sinking Louisiana island, a historic tribal land, many aren't ready to leave
ISLE DE JEAN CHARLES, LA. - This island will cease to exist. That much seems certain.
Over the last six decades, more than 98 percent of Isle de Jean Charles has vanished into the Gulf of Mexico, leaving a frail strip of land just two miles long and a quarter-mile wide.
With each high tide and with each hurricane, a little more of this historic Native American land sinks below the surface.
Cow pastures are gone. Rice fields are gone. The encroaching salt water seeps into the roots of the towering live-oak trees that loom over the bayou, transforming them into eerie gray skeletons.
Only about 40 residents remain - down from a peak of more than 300 - and few take part in the old rituals: crabbing on the bayou, trapping muskrats and mink, afternoon coffee out on the front porch.
As life on this narrow ridge of Louisiana's coast becomes more precarious, the state is pressing ahead with an unprecedented national experiment: a $48 million plan to move the entire community out of harm's way and build a new settlement in the hope of restoring its cultural traditions and old way of life.
Construction is scheduled to begin later this year. But the prospect
