Gustav hits the coast of New Orleans
The dreaded Hurricane Gustav ripped through the US Gulf coast last night, thrashing New Orleans with strong winds and heavy rain as it arrived, but sparing it the full force devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina three years ago.
The National Hurricane Centre downgraded winds to a category two shortly before it hit. The Louisiana coastline became a ghost town as an estimated two million people escaped the approaching storms, making it the largest evacuation in state history.
Late on Saturday, the city Mayor Ray Nagin ordered its 239,000 residents to leave in the face of “the mother of all storm” which last weak killed around 22 people in Cuba.
The few residents ignoring the Mayor’s advice gathered on front porches to watch the show. Power was out for an estimated 350,000 customers in the area.
Despite the city’s partially rebuilt levees reporting to hold for now, the Mayor warned residents against too much early optimism, saying “we are nowhere near out of danger yet. Those canals are full right now. I don’t know if we are going to get any more water pushed in that direction but that’s a big concern for me right now.”
The US Army Corps of Engineers, which rebuilt the levees after Katrina, expressed a little more hope and said water was “just sloshing” so far and were confident in the flood barrier.
Oil and natural gas prices plunged, but energy markets’ fears of serious supply disruptions were marginally eased as Gustav was downgraded, with expected 110mph winds, shortly before it hit.
Oil companies in the region, which normally provides a quarter of US oil output and 15 per cent of its natural gas had shut down nearly all production in the region in anticipation of the storm hitting. The hurricane took centre stage in US politics as Republicans opened their convention yesterday. President George W Bush, who was criticised for his delayed relief efforts when Katrina hit in 2005, cancelled his appearance at the convention in order to oversee emergency response efforts.