Alligator trade feeling its wallet

The French fashion industry, which relies on Louisiana for 300,000 alligator hides every year, is worried that swamped alligator farms and a disrupted hunting season will leave them short of watchstraps, handbags and shoes.

While there have been plenty of sightings of alligators in the floodwaters that have ravaged America's Gulf Coast, French tanneries are concerned that the shooting season, which was due to begin on September 3, will not deliver its normal load of hides. Around 80 per cent of hides are provided by hunters, with the remaining 20 per cent furnished by alligator farms.

"Next week, we are going to check the damage at our alligator farm south of New Orleans," Dan Lewkowicz, the head of France Croco, a reptile tannery, told Agence France Presse.

"The electricity has been cut off at the height of the height of the season for hatching, which requires heat. In addition, the animals risk dying of hunger since the workers have abandoned the plant and fled the region," he said.

More storms coming

As the pumps start to remove the floodwaters of Hurricane Katrina, the busy hurricane season continues. Tropical Storm Ophelia is due to hit the Florida coast today, bringing heavy rains and winds.

Two other storms currently over open water have also attracted the attention of forecasters at America's National Hurricane Centre. Tropical Storm Nate, the 14th named storm of the season, is expected to become a hurricane today and could threaten Bermuda at the end of the week.

Meanwhile, Hurricane Maria is safely raging 705 miles northeast of Bermuda and is expected weaken as it drifts over the cooler waters of the North Atlantic.

Doctors ready for outbreaks

The medical arm of the response to Hurricane Katrina is preparing for water-borne diseases to spread among survivors of the disaster. Yesterday, biologists and doctors from the Centre for Disease Control and Prevention headed for New Orleans to analyse the floodwaters that have gathered there.

Dr Mark Shah, of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, played down fears of outbreaks of cholera, typhoid and dysentery, which often accompany floods in developing countries, but admitted that the Government did not know quite what to expect.

Dr Shah said the only common ailment so far being reported among flood survivors was a severe skin rash: "Some of it is likely an allergic reaction to one or more of the myriad of things that are found in the water," he said. "We really don’t know what’s in the water, to be honest with you."

Jackson writes Katrina song

Michael Jackson will release a song to raise money for the victims of Hurricane Katrina within two weeks, his publicist said today. Jackson "has been moved to pen a song, with the working title, From the Bottom of My Heart," said a statement on his website.

"It pains me to watch the human suffering taking place in the Gulf Region of my country," the singer said from Bahrain, where is currently living. "My heart and prayers go out to every individual who has had to endure the pain and suffering caused by this tragedy."

"I will be reaching out to others within the music industry, to join me in helping to bring relief and hope to these resilient people who have lost everything."

In 1985, Jackson wrote We Are The World with Lionel Richie and performed the song with 45 other stars, including Bruce Springsteen, to raise more than $50 million for African famine relief. The new single will be recorded on 2 Seas Records, a label owned by Prince Abdulla Hamad Alkhalifa of Bahrain.

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