NEW ORLEANS – Locals and visitors to New Orleans wondered why the temporary barrier was meant to prevent cars from entering Bourbon Street, where the terrorist killed 14 people driving a truck through New Year’s Eve traffic in the early morning hours of January 1, lowered instead of raised, allowing vehicles to pass.
Temporary metal barriers were installed on Bourbon Street and other areas of the French Quarter in mid-November as the city was in the process of removing the old poles and replacing them with stainless steel poles. That work is expected to continue through January.
Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill referred Fox News to the New Orleans Police Department for questions about the barricades, but said her office will “evaluate everything over the next few weeks in preparation for the Super Bowl.”
“The local police force was the lead agency in the lead-up to the Sugar Bowl,” Murrill said. “Those questions should be directed to the New Orleans Police Department. We assure you that we will evaluate everything over the next few weeks in preparation for the Super Bowl.”
The New Orleans Police Department was not immediately available for comment.
A black flag with white lettering lies on the ground rolled up behind a pickup truck that a man drove into a crowd on Bourbon Street in New Orleans, killing and injuring several people, early Wednesday morning, Jan. 1, 2025. The FBI said they recovered the group’s flag from the vehicle Islamic State, with black and white letters. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)
Official recommendations for New Orleans safety measures in the French Quarter, as part of a $2.3 billion infrastructure project that began in 2017, included installing new bollards on Bourbon Street to prevent mass casualty events identified by the FBI as a potential threat in popular tourist area.
“The French Quarter is often densely packed with pedestrians and represents an area where a mass accident could occur,” a It is stated in the 2017 report. “This area is also a high-risk and targeted area for terrorism that the FBI has identified as a concern that the City must address. Following the attacks in Nice, France; London, England; and the recent incident in Times Square, New York City in which the columns saved lives, it became clear how popular tourist areas can be threatened by attackers with vehicles and weapons.”
The report recommends that Bourbon Street be closed to vehicular traffic, “with the exception of emergency vehicles, for specific times to be determined as part of a risk mitigation measure.”
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Authorities patrol Bourbon Street as it reopens in New Orleans, Louisiana, Thursday, Jan. 2, 2024. Multiple people are dead and dozens injured after a man crashed his car into a crowd of New Year’s revelers on Bourbon Street Wednesday. (Kat Ramirez for Fox News Digital)
Security recommendations for the area included street cameras, a central command center, better lighting and high-quality bollards that the US government also uses near its official buildings.
“When closed, the bollards will prevent uncontrolled vehicle access to Bourbon St, provide refugee areas on Bourbon St for pedestrians from traffic, while maintaining cross-street access to Bourbon St for emergencies and eliminating the need for law enforcement personnel to be stationed at barricades, freeing up more resources for crime prevention,” the report said.
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Authorities patrol Bourbon Street as it reopens in New Orleans, Louisiana, Thursday, Jan. 2, 2024. Multiple people are dead and dozens injured after a man crashed his car into a crowd of New Year’s revelers on Bourbon Street Wednesday. (Kat Ramirez for Fox News Digital)
Former FBI official Bill Daly, security and risk management consultant, told Fox News Digital that the “Achilles heel” in the January 1 tragedy was that the temporary measures used on New Year’s Eve did not provide the same level of protection that was previously intended, designed and envisioned in a report for in 2017
“Temporary barricades are used extensively. They are used, for example, by the New York Police Department in Times Square, to close off all the side streets leading to Times Square,” Daly said. “They use concrete blocks that they actually put on the sidewalk and in the middle of the street as temporary barricades, and some also put vehicles. They use garbage trucks, they use trucks, they use various heavy vehicles, and sometimes just police cars to block the road, but it’s also important to block the sidewalk.”
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A barricade on Bourbon Street (right) is re-erected on January 2, the day after the terrorist attack, while a barrier on another street in the French Quarter (left) appears on January 2. (Kat Ramirez for Fox News Digital)
Multiple business employees near the Bourbon Street entrance told Fox News Digital that authorities installed temporary barriers around Christmas to block traffic at certain French Quarter street entrances while the city plans to repair and upgrade its permanent barriers.
However, the barrier located at the intersection of Canal and Bourbon Streets was not upright on New Year’s Eve, meaning vehicles were able to drive over the flattened barricade and onto Bourbon Street from Canal Street. The video shows Jabbar driving a rental pickup off Canal Street and going around a police vehicle blockade at the Bourbon Street entrance before plowing into revelers.
Fox News has learned since the Jan. 1 attack that New Orleans had multiple barriers in place that could have prevented or limited the scope of the terrorist attack, although New Orleans Police Chief Anne Kirkpatrick said at a press conference afterward that she was unaware the barriers existed.
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Tourists walk past temporary barriers at Orleans and Bourbon streets, Thursday, Jan. 2, 2025, in New Orleans. (AP Photo/George Walker IV)
“Actually, we have them,” she said of the barriers. “I didn’t know about them, but we have them, so now we’ve been able to shut them down.”
The CEO of Meridian Rapid Defense Group confirmed to Fox News that his company sold 48 Archer barriers to New Orleans in 2017 — the same barriers the city installed on sidewalks around the French Quarter before Bourbon Street reopened Thursday after federal officials concluded their assessment crime scene.
Pedestrians walk along Bourbon Street as it reopens in New Orleans, Louisiana, Thursday, Jan. 2, 2024. Multiple people are dead and dozens injured after a man crashed his car into a crowd of New Year’s revelers on Bourbon Street on Wednesday. (Kat Ramirez for Fox News Digital)
Peter Whitford said the 700-pound L-shaped steel barriers are “the strongest moving barriers in the world,” designed to stop a 5,500-pound truck going 60 MPH.
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“Not only did they not know they had them, they didn’t even know how to describe them,” Whitford said of New Orleans officials describing the barriers. “Even now, in the pictures I’ve seen, the barriers aren’t even set properly because the wheels are still down.”
The defense company is trying to get in touch with city officials to explain how to install the barriers, which were improperly installed.
