Blackwater in New Orleans

Private security firms are stepping into the vacuum created by the failure of the government to protect life and property in New Orleans.

The Steele Foundation, headquartered in San Francisco, was called in by several major corporate clients to the inundated city where local police are scarce and food, water or fuel has yet to arrive from the federal government.

"At this point, all of our efforts are focused on providing physical security for people who are trapped as well as providing humanitarian relief," said Kenn Kurtz, chief executive officer of the Steele Foundation. The company is looking after clients with hotels and holed up employees and their families, some with urgent medical needs.

"Right now these people are alone...there is no military presence in downtown New Orleans," he said.

The Steele Foundation, which at one time protected Haiti's president Jean Bertrand Aristide and operates in Iraq, specializes in business risk consulting, protective security work and training.

The company has set up a mobile command post in downtown New Orleans and its clearly-identified security teams are armed but mostly with non-lethal ammunition, Kurtz said. Some 16,000 military rations, bottled water as well as fuel have been brought in but looters have attacked the company's vehicles.

"We can't get fuel into many places because it's too dangerous to travel," Kurtz.

Blackwater USA is sending about 50 employees to the Gulf region along with a transport helicopter and two cargo planes, according to spokeswoman Anne Duke. The security company has offered to help the Coast Guard with pro bono rescue work and is working with private-sector firms to help protect infrastructure and cultural buildings in the city, she said.

"I definitely don't think Blackwater would have been contacted if it wasn't a serious situation," said Duke. She declined to detail who the company is working for in the area.

Blackwater, which draws on former military and law enforcement personnel, has taken on some very high-profile tasks in Iraq.