Hurricane Ida made landfall in Louisiana with winds of up to 240 km / h
New Orleans was already swept away this Sunday morning by heavy rains and violent squalls.
AP - Gerald Herbert
Text by: RFI Follow
3 min
Sixteen years to the day after the arrival of Hurricane Katrina which devastated Louisiana, Hurricane Ida made landfall this Sunday shortly before noon in this same region of the southern United States, announced the American meteorological services.
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The residents of Fort Fourchon, south of New Orleans, were the first to be struck by Hurricane Ida, one of the most dangerous in decades.
It was 11:55 a.m. local time.
Ida's effects were already being felt further inland.
More than 120,000 homes were thus deprived of electricity at midday, reports the specialized site poweroutage.us.
And in several places, the ocean level has been measured more than a meter and a half above its usual average, says the American Hurricane Center (NHC).
Authorities asked everyone to evacuate on Friday. The roads were quickly congested, but some remained at home nonetheless. Like the 390,000 inhabitants of New Orleans where the authorities were taken aback and did not decree a mandatory evacuation. In the city, already swept this Sunday morning by showers and strong squalls, the stores were mostly barricaded with boards and sandbags.
Floods, hours of rain and wind as severe as in tornadoes are now expected and for several days. "
The next 24 to 36 hours are going to be absolutely crucial for us here in Louisiana,
" the governor warned earlier on CNN, saying "
believe
" that the costly dike system put in place after the Katrina devastation in 2005 was going to "
hold
”.
16 years ago to the day, on August 29, 2005, Hurricane Katrina ravaged Louisiana, killing 1,577 people and causing $ 100 billion in damage, recalls our correspondent in Houston,
Thomas Harms
.
Katrina was a Category 3 hurricane, while Ida is poised to drop from Category 4 to 5, the most destructive on the hurricane scale.
This hurricane comes as Louisiana faces a new wave of Covid, with a poorly vaccinated population.
Hospitals are already overwhelmed and shelters have decided to reduce their reception capacities so as not to become areas of contamination.
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