NEW ORLEANS - Some 36 hours after New Orleans was rocked by a terror attack, bar worker Samantha Petry wiped her tears and placed flowers Thursday on Bourbon Street, which reopened with few hints of the trauma inflicted on the iconic nightlife hub.
Cleaning crews had washed down streets of the famed French Quarter after authorities largely concluded their on-site investigation of a grisly New Year's truck-ramming attack that left at least 14 people dead and 30 others injured.
At the entrance to Bourbon Street, 14 yellow roses were placed along a wall where an elderly man dropped to his knees and prayed, his head nearly touching the sidewalk. Crosses were erected nearby as a makeshift memorial.
Business owners and co-workers hugged. A jazz band performed a traditional New Orleans "second line" that featured people marching and dancing down Bourbon Street in mourning and celebration.
Petry walked over and added her bouquet to the flowers, as curious tourists walked onto the normally packed promenade full of drinking establishments, jazz and blues clubs, restaurants and strip joints.
She works at the Cat's Meow karaoke bar, but she bristled at how quickly Bourbon Street was reverting to party central after tragedy.
"No, I'm not happy" about the area's rapid reopening, she told AFP, adding she would have preferred time to mourn those who died and seek to confirm all her friends were OK.
"It's all for money," added Petry, who moved to Louisiana from California. "But at the same time, I do have a livelihood and I have to work."
She and her co-workers endure the slow season in order to work New Year's Eve, and major events like Mardi Gras and the NFL's upcoming Super Bowl championship, Petry said.
"But how am I going to feel safe to work here?"
- Wall-to-wall crowds -
Nothing on Bourbon suggested a mass casualty incident had occurred.
By nightfall, American football fans poured onto the street to party following the Sugar Bowl game between the University of Georgia and University of Notre Dame, while mourners simultaneously sobbed at the vigil.
Wall-to-wall crowds streamed past daiquiri bars and strip clubs, as restaurants served seafood and Cajun specialties -- all under the watchful eye of police who patrolled the streets and entrance points, including one blocked by a truck.
"We're not going to let terror ruin our weekend. We've had this trip planned forever," said 20-something college graduate Ingrid Dolvin, wearing a necklace of plastic beads and carrying a frozen drink.
"Yesterday, tensions were kind of scary, but today feels like a completely normal day back on Bourbon Street," she told AFP.
Dolvin said she was "obviously thinking about all the victims and the families" but felt safe given the police presence and security sweeps following the attack.
"New Orleans is a city of tremendous spirit. You can't keep it down. You really can't. And we're seeing that today," US President Joe Biden said Thursday.
- 'We celebrate life' -
Authorities say a US Army veteran inspired by Islamic extremists rammed his rented Ford pickup truck into revellers. The bloodshed only ended when the suspect crashed, and was shot and killed by police after an exchange of gunfire.
Video footage circulating online shows the suspect, identified as US citizen Shamsud-Din Jabbar of Texas, driving the pickup slowly through traffic on Canal Street after 3:00 am Wednesday, then turning sharply around a police vehicle and barreling down Bourbon Street to begin his deadly rampage.
On Thursday, a man in a full-length mirrored suit high-fived visitors and posed for selfies on Bourbon Street.
Mirror Man, as he identified himself, said his goal was "to bring joy back to the city of New Orleans."
But is the return to normalcy too soon?
"In New Orleans, this is what we do," he told AFP. "We celebrate life -- during, before and after, unfortunately."
David Tripp, who works in the Harley Davidson shop on Bourbon Street, shared a similar sentiment, noting that the city, and especially the debauchery of the nightlife spot, stops for no disaster -- natural, such as a hurricane, or manmade.
"I think it was the right thing to do... The businesses need it," the 62-year-old New Orleans native said.
"We can't let nothing hold us down," he added.
"I've been here through (Hurricane) Katrina and all. We get right back up and running. That's how we are."
- by Michael Mathes