Airborne Inequity: Hurricane’s Transportation of Pollutants in Cancer Alley

Along the Mississippi River from Baton Rouge to New Orleans, Louisiana, lies an 85-mile stretch of land known as Cancer Alley (US: Louisiana’s ‘Cancer Alley,’ 2024). This corridor has become synonymous with environmental injustice and disproportionate health risks for the predominantly African American communities residing along it (Singer, Medical Anthropology Quarterly 25:141–163, 2011). The origins of Cancer Alley's notoriety can be traced back to a convergence of historical injustices and industrial expansion.