BREAKING: Hurricane Ida has strengthened to a Category 2 storm in the Gulf of Mexico as it approaches Louisiana. The U.S. National Hurricane Center says the storm’s maximum sustained winds increased Saturday afternoon to 100 mph.
Highways on the northern Gulf Coast saw steady traffic as people moved to get out of the storm’s way. Trucks pulling saltwater fishing boats and campers were part of a steady stream of vehicles leaving the coast on Interstate 65 in south Alabama. Traffic snarls were reported on Interstate 10 heading west out of New Orleans.
“That said, if we see 10 to 20 inches of rain over an abbreviated period of time, we will see flooding,” he said.“We were willing to wait it out but the hotel said we had to leave,” said visitor Lays Lafaurie of Fort Worth, Texas, waiting in a rental car line at the city’s airport. “They said we had to leave by 7 tomorrow morning. But if we’d waited that long there wouldn’t have been any cars left.
Many gas stations in New Orleans and its suburbs were out of gas, and the few still open had lines more than a dozen cars deep and a wait time of nearly an hour. Katrina was a Category 3 when it made landfall southwest of New Orleans, Ida is expected to reach an extremely dangerous Category 4 hurricane, with top winds of 130 mph before making landfall likely west of New Orleans late Sunday.
In New Orleans, city officials said residents need to be prepared for prolonged power outages, and asked elderly residents to consider evacuating. Collin Arnold, the city’s emergency management director, said the city could be under high winds for about 10 hours.
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Louisiana Braces For Major Hurricane As Tropical Storm Ida Strengthens On Path To Gulf CoastI am a London-based reporter for Forbes covering breaking news. Previously, I have worked as a reporter for a specialist legal publication covering big data and as a freelance journalist and policy analyst covering science, tech and health. I have a master’s degree in Biological Natural Sciences and a master’s degree in the History and Philosophy of Science from the University of Cambridge. Follow me on Twitter theroberthart or email me at rhartforbes.com
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