Hurricane Ida winds hit 150 mph ahead of Louisiana strike

By KEVIN MCGILL and JAY REEVES

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Hurricane Ida rapidly grew successful spot aboriginal Sunday, becoming a unsafe Category 4 hurricane conscionable hours earlier hitting the Louisiana seashore arsenic exigency officials successful the portion grappled with opening shelters for displaced evacuees amid the hazard of spreading the coronavirus.

As Ida moved done immoderate of the warmest water h2o successful the satellite successful the bluish Gulf of Mexico, its apical winds grew by 45 mph (72 kph) to 150 mph (230 kph) successful 5 hours. The strategy was expected to marque landfall aboriginal Sunday day connected the nonstop day Hurricane Katrina ravaged Louisiana and Mississippi 16 years earlier.

The National Hurricane Center said Ida was expected to support its spot conscionable 6 mph shy of a Category 5 hurricane until landfall. Only 4 Category 5 hurricanes person made landfall successful the United States: Michael successful 2018, Andrew successful 1992, Camille successful 1969 and the Labor Day Hurricane of 1935. Both Michael and Andrew were upgraded to class 5 agelong aft the tempest deed with further reappraisal of damage.

Ida threatened a portion already reeling from a resurgence of COVID-19 infections, owed to debased vaccination rates and the highly contagious delta variant.

New Orleans hospitals planned to thrust retired the tempest with their beds astir full, arsenic likewise stressed hospitals elsewhere had small country for evacuated patients. And shelters for those fleeing their homes carried an added hazard of becoming flashpoints for caller infections.

Hurricane unit winds started to onslaught Grand Isle connected Sunday morning. Before powerfulness was mislaid connected the Louisiana obstruction island, a beachfront web camera showed the water steadily rising arsenic increasing waves churned and thenar trees whipped.

Forecasters warned winds stronger than 115 mph (185 kph) were expected soon successful Houma, a metropolis of 33,000 that supports lipid platforms successful the Gulf.

In New Orleans, wherever the worst upwind is expected later, a airy rainfall fell. Cars were parked connected the median, which is simply a fewer feet higher and tin support against imaginable flooding

Ida intensified truthful swiftly that New Orleans officials said determination was nary clip to signifier a mandatory evacuation of its 390,000 residents. Mayor LaToya Cantrell urged residents to permission voluntarily. Those who stayed were warned to hole for agelong powerfulness outages amid sweltering heat.

Nick Mosca was walking his dog, similar astir of those who were out.

“I’d similar to beryllium amended prepared. There’s a fewer things I’m reasoning we could person done. But this tempest came beauteous quick, truthful you lone person the clip you have,” Mosca said.

Gov. John Bel Edwards vowed Saturday that Louisiana’s “resilient and pugnacious people” would upwind the storm. He besides noted shelters would run with reduced capacities “to bespeak the realities of COVID.”

Edwards said Louisiana officials were moving to find edifice rooms for evacuees truthful that less had to enactment successful wide shelters. He noted that during past year’s hurricane season, Louisiana recovered rooms for 20,000 people.

Coastal Gulfport, Mississippi, was battered Sunday by aggravated rain. A Red Cross structure posted signs displaying directions for evacuees, on with warnings astir COVID-19. Shelter manager Barbara Casterlin said workers were required to deterioration look masks. Evacuees were encouraged to bash the same. Anyone who refuses volition beryllium sent to an isolated area, she said, arsenic volition radical who are sick.

“We’re not checking vaccinations,” Casterlin said, “but we are doing somesthesia checks 2 oregon 3 times a day.”

President Joe Biden approved exigency declarations for Louisiana and Mississippi up of Ida’s arrival.

Comparisons to the Aug. 29, 2005, landfall of Katrina weighed heavy connected residents bracing for Ida. A Category 3 storm, Katrina was blamed for 1,800 deaths arsenic it caused levee breaches and catastrophic flooding successful New Orleans and demolished oceanfront homes successful Mississippi. Ida’s hurricane unit winds stretched little than 40 miles (64 kilometers) from the storm’s eye, oregon little than fractional the size of Katrina.

Officials stressed that the levee and drainage systems protecting New Orleans had been overmuch improved since Katrina. But they cautioned flooding was inactive possible, with up to 24 inches (61 centimeters) of rainfall forecast successful immoderate areas.

“Ida volition astir decidedly beryllium stronger than Katrina, and by a beauteous large margin,’ said University of Miami hurricane researcher Brian McNoldy. “And, the worst of the tempest volition walk implicit New Orleans and Baton Rouge, which got the weaker broadside of Katrina.”

About 2 cardinal radical unrecorded successful and astir New Orleans and Baton Rouge, with galore less radical on the Mississippi River and wetlands to the south, which volition get the brunt of the hurricane first.

Edwards said 5,000 National Guard troops were being deployed successful 14 Louisiana parishes for hunt and rescue efforts. And 10,000 linemen were connected standby to respond to electrical outages.

Hurricane Ida astir doubled successful strength, going from an 85 mph tempest to a 150 mph tempest successful conscionable 24 hours, which meteorologists called “explosive intensification.”

“Yikes! Ida leaves maine stunned,” said Jeff Masters, a erstwhile National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration hurricane huntsman meteorologist and laminitis of Weather Underground.

He warned the portion could look devastation to its infrastructure, which includes petrochemical sites and large ports. The state’s 17 lipid refineries relationship for astir one-fifth of the U.S. refining capableness and its 2 liquefied earthy state export terminals vessel astir 55% of the nation’s full exports, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. Louisiana is besides location to 2 atomic powerfulness plants, 1 adjacent New Orleans and different astir 27 miles (about 43 kilometers) northwest of Baton Rouge.

The Interstate 10 corridor betwixt New Orleans and Baton Rouge is simply a captious hub of the nation’s petrochemical industry, lined with lipid refineries, earthy state terminals and chemic manufacturing plants. Entergy, Louisiana’s large energy provider, operates 2 atomic powerfulness plants on the Mississippi River.

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Reeves reported from Gulfport, Mississippi. Associated Press writers Rebecca Santana, Stacey Plaisance and Janet McConnaughey successful New Orleans; Emily Wagster Pettus successful Jackson, Mississippi; Jeff Martin successful Marietta, Georgia; Seth Borenstein successful Kensington, Maryland; Frank Bajak successful Boston; Michael Biesecker successful Washington; Pamela Sampson successful Atlanta; and Jeffrey Collins successful Columbia, South Carolina, contributed to this report.