The 24-story Pearl Beach Club oceanfront luxury hotel at the east end of Bostwick Avenue could break ground next year, says its developers.

Natalie Oakes, 38, had worked her way up in the NHS, earning around £50,000, but took the leap and took a job in Abu Dhabi before moving to Dubai a year later.

While much of the focus marking 20 years since Hurricane Katrina is on New Orleans, where federal levees failed and flooded the city, the historic storm also decimated the Mississippi Gulf Coast.