New Orleans Orders Mandatory Evac, Gustav Upgraded to Cat 4

UPDATED: With mandatory evacuation notice

Gustav is upgraded to an "extremely dangerous" Category 4 hurricane and an estimated 1 million people fled the Gulf Coast before the mandatory evacuation order for New Orleans residents. The storm threatens to strike the Gulf Coast harder than Hurricane Katrina did three years ago this weekend.

The evacuation of New Orleans becomes mandatory at 8 a.m. Sunday along the vulnerable west bank of the Mississippi River and noon on the east bank. Mayor Ray C. Nagin calls Gustav the "mother of all storms" and told residents to "get out of town. This is not the one to play with."

With winds exceeding 145 mph, Gustav became a Category 4 storm on Saturday as it menaced western Cuba. Forecasters predict the storm will reach Category 5—the strongest level—and winds at better than 155 mph before hitting the Gulf Coast states as early as September 1. Gustav has already killed more than 80 people in the Caribbean, and, if current forecasts hold, it will make landfall Monday afternoon "somewhere between East Texas and western Mississippi."

Hurricane Katrina struck Louisiana on Aug. 29, 2005 as a Category 3 hurricane with winds near 130 mph. New Orleans suffered a catastrophic flood as the city's levee system collapsed. It killed 1,800 people and caused more than $80 billion in damage. This was the most destruction of any U.S. storm.

New Orleans Orders Mandatory Evacuation [AP]
Gustav Upgraded to Cat 4 [Bloomberg]
Officials Urge New Orleans Residents to Evacuate [WaPo]

Comments

[Jim]

Today is my birthday. This is the second time in five years that my birthday present to New Orleans has been a terrible storm.

I have nothing against you, New Orleans. I left you years ago because I knew that if I stayed, I would probably be murdered in cold blood, as four of my friends were. But I have never forgotten you.

Today and for the second time this week, I called an old friend in New Orleans, to see how he was getting ready for the storm. When, again, he didn’t answer, I called a mutual friend of ours in Lake Charles. It turns out Nat died last week of liver failure. He had drunk himself to death, ever more fiercely since his neighborhood was hit by Katrina.

Nat, gay son of an impoverished, alcoholic, wife-abusing sharecropper from Halifax County, North Carolina, found his spiritual home and his liquid death in the City That Care Forgot.

Here’s to you, Nat. At least you won’t go through Katrina twice.

[Dex123ter]

Sorry about your friend, Jim.

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I recently went to New Orleans on a family vacation. Many of the areas of New Orleans had been rebuilt. Many areas had not. So, hopefully, Gustav won't do too much damage.

[freeleo]

Well Jim, that's about the saddest story I've heard in a long time. Be careful brother. Birthdays can be depressing any way. Make sure you do something you enjoy with people you care about. I wish you well brother.

[Jim]

Thanks, freeleo. I had had a glass of wine when I posted that. I’m sure I would never have posted it otherwise. But the wine and the Gustav post made me tell my story, even if it was not appropriate for this blog. So sorry to get all depressing on ya.