A police officer consoles a rescued baby in New Orleans. (Reuters)

New Orleans, Sept. 2 (Reuters): New Orleans, fell deeper into chaos today with gangs roaming the streets and corpses rotting in the sun a full four days after Hurricane Katrina lashed the city and exposed federal aid efforts as a failure.

Hospitals lacking drugs and power were in a desperate fight to save critically ill patients, police hid in their headquarters and thousands of people who lost relatives and everything they own in raging floodwaters sat helplessly on sidewalks waiting for help that has not come.

Hit by mounting criticism that his administration was too slow to respond, President George W. Bush conceded the rescue efforts were “not acceptable”

“I want to assure the people of the affected areas and this country that we’ll deploy the assets necessary to get the situation under control,” Bush said as he left Washington to tour the region. In response to Bush’s assurance, an emergency military convoy of aid supplies arrived in New Orleans today to help in the relief effort.

Thousands of people are feared dead and New Orleans mayor Ray Nagin said he was furious at the lack of help his historic city had received.

“I need reinforcements. I need troops, man. I need 500 buses, man,” he said in a radio interview. “Now get off your asses and fix this. Let’s do something and let’s fix the biggest goddam crisis in the history of this country.”

Police kept to their headquarters in fear of the anarchy as looters, shooters and gangs ruled the streets.

Plumes of thick black smoke rose after a mighty explosion rocked an industrial area hit hard by Katrina. Stunned residents stumbled around bodies that lay rotting and untouched.

Most of the victims were poor and black, largely because they have no cars and so were unable to flee the city before Katrina pounded the US Gulf Coast on Monday. The scenes of destruction and mayhem resembled those of a major Third World refugee crisis, angering politicians and local residents who said the lack of aid was unacceptable in the world’s richest country.