Millions left in the dark as Zeta storms across South
ATLANTA — Millions of peoplewere without power and at least six were dead Thursday after Hurricane Zeta slammed into Louisiana and made a beeline across the South.
In its wake, the storm left shattered buildings, thousands of downed trees and fresh anguish over a record-setting hurricane season.
From the bayous of the Gulf Coast to Atlanta and beyond, Southerners used to dealing with dangerous weather were left to pick up the pieces once again just days ahead of an election in which early voting continued despite the storm.
In Atlanta and New Orleans, drivers dodged trees in roads and navigated intersections without traffic signals.
In Lakeshore, Miss., Ray Garcia returned home to find a shrimp boat washed up and resting against its pilings
“I don’t even knowif insurance is going to pay for this,” Garcia said. “I don’t know what this boat has done.”
As many as 2.6 million homes and businesses lost power across seven states, but the lights were coming back on slowly.
Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards said the state sustained “catastrophic” damage on Grand Isle in Jefferson Parish, where Zeta punched three breaches in the levee.
Edwards ordered the Louisiana National Guard to fly in soldiers to assist with search and rescue efforts and urged continued caution.
“Oddly enough, it isn’t the storms that typically produce the most injuries and the fatalities. It’s the cleanup efforts. It’s the use of generators. It’s the carbon monoxide poisoning. It’s the electrocution that comes from power lines. So, now is the time to be very, very cautious out there,” Edwards said.
A Category 2 hurricane when it hit the southeastern Louisiana coast Wednesday, Zeta weakened to a post-tropical storm by Thursday afternoon with maximum sustained winds of 50 mph, the U.S. National Hurricane Center reported.
The fast-moving storm was centered about 25 miles southwest of Cape May, N. J., and was forecast to head east-northeast over the open Atlantic.
North Carolina and southeastern Virginia still were being buffeted with gusty winds, but Zeta was moving along at 53 mph, meaning no single place was blasted too long.
Zeta was the 27th named storm of a historically busy year with more than a month left in the Atlantic hurricane season.
It set a record as the11th named storm to make landfall in the continental U.S. in a single season, well beyond the nine storms that hit in 1916.
The heightened storm activity has focused attention on climate change.
Forecasters said disturbed air off the northern coast of South America could become a tropical depression and head towardNicaragua by early next week