HOUMA — From his seat next to his wife Carla in Section 150 of the Louisiana Superdome on game day, Houma resident Michael Thibodaux can clearly see what once was.
The storage containers. The stacks of pipes. The workers in hard hats. The cranes. The forklifts. The tarps covering the seats.
Four years ago, there was no football here. No field even. No 70,000 screaming fans right alongside him rooting on the Saints.
It was just a construction site.
Following Hurricane Katrina in late August 2005, the Superdome, like New Orleans and many of its residents, was battered.
The stadium was used as a shelter of last resort and took a hard hit from the storm, inside and out. But now Thibodaux, in his second season as a season-ticket holder, takes pride in the finished product.
That's because a set of events led Thibodaux, 51, to have a large part in the building's revival.
Before the storm, Thibodaux had worked in oilfield construction for J. Ray McDermott, for 29 years.
“One of our major contractors offshore offered me a position in New Orleans,” Thibodaux said. “But that project went away with Katrina, so our company bid on the Superdome repairs and finished second.”
A mistake by the firm that won the bid allowed the company Thibodaux works for, Broadmoor Construction of Metairie, to land the job of repairing the building's interior in 2006.
Thibodaux is a project scheduler, a critical position on any major construction job who plans the work in sequence on paper and decides how it must flow to get done efficiently and effectively.
“I worked with the project manager and superintendent to lay out their plan,” said Thibodaux, who has a degree in business administration as well as certification in project management. “We had close to 2,000 different tasks to do to get the Superdome ready for the first game in 2006.”
Thibodaux, a lifelong Saints fan, said the workers at the Superdome were motivated, and so were their bosses.
“We had a few season-ticket holders working on the Dome, but just about everybody working there had been to a Saints game there at least once in their life,” Michael said. “Everybody realized how much of an icon it was to the area. At the beginning of the project, my boss, Roy Mouledous was in a meeting with (Saints owner) Tom Benson, and Tom Benson said “Y'all need to have this done on time because this is our place to play.” My boss said, ‘As long as you have a team show up, we'll have the Superdome ready.' ”
And ready it was. Early, in fact.
The Saints reopened the Superdome on Sept. 25, 2006, by beating the Atlanta Falcons, 23-3, in what some fans say was a religious experience and one of the most memorable moments in the team's history.
Michael and his wife of 20 years Carla, 50, were there in a suite.
“For me, it's been a dream to watch my husband work on a project like this,” said Carla, whose favorite player is quarterback Drew Brees because of his work with the community. “He always worked offshore doing scheduling; I never could go see the projects that he worked on.
“For me to be able to see what he works on now is awesome. The first night back was phenomenal. All I could do was watch the people screaming and having so much fun, and it was just awesome to know my husband was one of the ones who worked on this dome.”
For his efforts, Thibodaux, along with other workers on his team, got to walk to the very top of the Dome and was asked to sign a poster of the stadium, which is framed and hangs inside. He also signed a Saints helmet with other workers that is now on display at the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio.
“This project gave me the highest degree of gratification,” Michael said. “It is a place that we go to all the time now. It's such a part of our culture down here.”
Thibodaux, who still commutes to and from work in Metairie every day and is a big fan of receiver Devery Henderson, said it is hard to believe the Saints have come so far as a franchise since Katrina. In that 2005 season, they were 3-13, and now they are hosting the Superdome's first-ever NFC championship game and are a win away from playing in the Super Bowl.
“At that point, we never thought it was possible,” Michael said. “We had a new coach (Sean Payton) and a new quarterback with an injured shoulder (Brees) coming in. It was a far, far away dream, but in four short years, we are there. It has been everybody's dream to have a season like this.”
