Baby Born Of Heroism In Katrina Aftermath

Getting pregnant was never easy for Glen and Rebekah Markham, so they saw invitro fertilization as a godsend. It allowed them to have their first son, Witt, two years ago.

"The way he came out and he's beautiful and you know … how we love him so much, I just wanted to have another one," Glen Markham said.

But they wanted another child. The Markhams stored five more embryos at fertility clinic in New Orleans. After Hurricane Katrina, the area around the clinic was flooded.

The canisters holding the Markhams' frozen embryos, along with about 1,200 others, were topped off with liquid nitrogen before the storm and moved to the third floor, according to the clinic's disaster plan.

"It was probably, probably three weeks after the hurricane and I was — and I said, 'You know, I wonder what happened to the embryos,' " Rebekah Markham said.

But days later, with the area still flooded and without power, one of the clinic's doctors was worried. She persuaded the governor to allow a rescue on Sept 11, 2005, and embryos were found intact.

"I had a lot of anxiety about the fact that we really had no control at that point over what was happening to them," Dr. Belinda Sartor said.

The embryos could remain safely frozen for weeks in the best situation, but with the power out — and temperatures in New Orleans topping 100 degrees — the embryos could be lost. Two police officers, along with more than a dozen other people, used boats to reach the flooded hospital. The embryos were found, still frozen and ready to be used.

"We motored right down this lane toward the hospital," Lt. Eric Bumgarner said while pointing out the path he took. "You had to be very careful for submerged things."

Rebekah Markham, 32, said she didn't know how to thank the officers who rescued the embryo that became her son.

"They really risked some things. Some people were saying, 'Don't get in the water.' And they did it and really probably didn't understand the magnitude of what they were doing at the time," she told The Early Show co-anchor Hannah Storm. "But even more now when I look at this little precious baby and I think that that's what they went in there and rescued, it's amazing. I don't know how to thank them. I don't know if I ever can.

"I just hope they can understand how much it means to me and how blessed I feel and how rich they've made my life to be able to bring this little baby home in a day or so."

Rebekah Markham had evacuated before the hurricane with their toddler, Glen Witter "Witt" Markham Jr., while her husband, a New Orleans police officer, stayed to work.

Mother and son actually evacuated twice. The first time was to relatives' about a half-hour from their brick-and-tan-siding home, nestled among 40-foot-tall pine trees in Covington.

But the storm toppled trees and cut electricity across south Louisiana. Their first refuge became a poor place to care for a toddler who had turned 1 only 10 days before the storm, so they went to Rebekah Markham's sister's home in central Louisiana.

A cell phone text message — "R U OK?" — the day after the storm told her that her husband had survived.

He was stationed across the Mississippi River from flooded parts of the city. But it had its own dangers. One member of his squad was shot in the head Aug. 29 after confronting looters at a gas station.

Markham, 42, never got his wife's answer to his text query. His phone's battery was dead.

"It was about two weeks before I found out that they were OK," he said.

It took longer than that to have time to think about the embryos. When Rebekah Markham called, she learned that they had been rescued.

Months later, the Markhams were pregnant. Noah Markham was born by Caesarean section at 7:23 a.m. CDT at St. Tammany Hospital. Before the procedure, Rebekah Markham had decided on the name — provided the baby was a boy — "because God put it on his heart to build an ark."

"Glen's sister Pam actually saw a newspaper article that was written and it was titled 'Saving Grace.' For some reason that made her think of Noah and the ark. So when Glen's mother told me about it, I fell in love with the name and thought it was so appropriate," she told Storm. "And it was the first name that we instantly agreed on."

The baby checked in 8 pounds 6 1/2 ounces and 19 1/2 inches long. Doctors said the baby was in good shape.

They are not sure whether they will have a third.

"I thought three would be the ideal number," Rebekah Markham has said. But her medical problems have required bed rest for the first three months of each pregnancy. "And I was even more sick with this one than with Witt."

They also needed a lot of family help to take care of Witt, a boy who never seems to stop running. So any decision probably will be postponed until both children are in school. For now, the family is grateful to welcome another son into their home.

"You have no idea what it's like to — to have fertility problems and such 'cause we were married 10 years before we had our little boy," Rebekah Markham said.