On the third anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans has a wary eye on Gustav, some communities canceling several scheduled memorials and focusing on storm preparations instead.
On Friday, Tropical Storm Gustav was near Jamaica -claiming 67 deaths in its path. Forecasters said it could hit the Louisiana coast early next week as a major hurricane. City and state officials were preparing for possible evacuations starting Saturday. Some nursing homes and hospitals planned to start moving patients further inland.
Mississippi’s Governor called for a mandatory evacuation of Katrina victims still living in temporary homes along the coast on Friday.
New Orleans is taking no chances and said it is prepared to move 30,000 residents in an evacuation - estimates of the city’s population are between 310,000 to 340,000 people, more than 100,000 less than before Katrina. We are about to see what has been learned three years later.
The only thing the National Hurricane Center can say for sure is that landfall is possible throughout the northern Gulf Coast, showing a wide cone of probability, from Texas to the Florida Panhandle. Gee, thanks for that guys – as usual, a flip of the coin is just as useful.
Those of us in Florida and throughout the U.S. are keeping you in our thoughts, fingers crossed, while looking over our shoulders at Tropical Storm Hanna, playing off to our east.
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