Pascagoula (păskəg
`lə), city (1990 pop. 25,899), seat of Jackson co., extreme SE Miss. A port of entry on Mississippi Sound at the mouth of the Pascagoula River, it is a resort and a fishing and shipbuilding center. There is petroleum refining, catfish and seafood processing, and factories producing steel, concrete, lumber, and plywood. A naval station is on an island in the river. It grew around the "Old Spanish Fort," built in 1718 and still extant. Large quantities of lumber were shipped from Pascagoula in the late 19th cent. Parts of the city were devastated in 2005 by Hurricane Katrina.