Sixteen years after the devastation of Katrina, the inhabitants of New Orleans were deprived of electricity when Hurricane Ida passed through Louisiana on the night of Sunday to Monday.
The hurricane which weakened during the night, after having made at least one victim and much damage.
Classified in category 4 when it made landfall on Sunday shortly before noon local time on the coasts of this southern state of the United States, the hurricane fell back early Monday in category 1 on the Saffir-Simpson scale which includes it. 5, according to US meteorological services.
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"Rapid weakening is expected over the next day, but Ida is expected to remain a hurricane until late tonight," the National Hurricane Center (NHC) said in its early evening report on Sunday. In total, nearly a million homes were without electricity Sunday night across Louisiana, according to the specialized site poweroutage.us. The Entergy company, which distributes electricity in Southeast Louisiana, said it is providing emergency power to city departments in charge of pumping stations helping to control the flooding. The US National Weather Service has warned of the "deadly risk" created by the hurricane and urged residents of affected areas to "take all necessary measures to protect their lives and property."At 01:00 local Monday (06:00 GMT), Ida was making progress with winds of 120 km / h and was expected to continue to weaken as it crossed land, according to weather services, with a trajectory taking her north then east for reach the middle of the Atlantic coast on Wednesday. One person was killed by a fallen tree in Prairieville, near New Orleans, the local sheriff's office said.
"Do not go out", hammered all weekend the meteorological services which recommend to the inhabitants to take refuge in a room without windows of their residence and to be sealed there. The White House announced on Sunday that federal agencies have deployed more than 2,000 emergency response specialists, including search teams, as well as supplies of water, food and electric generators. The memory of Katrina, which made landfall on August 29, 2005, remains painful in Louisiana. More than 1,800 people had died and the damage had run into tens of billions of dollars.
