Huge storm aims at New Orleans

Hurricane Ida struck Cuba on Friday and threatened to slam into Louisiana with far greater force over the weekend, prompting New Orleans’ mayor to order everyone outside the protection of the city’s levees to evacuate.

Ida intensified rapidly Friday from a tropical storm to a hurricane with top winds of 80 mph as it crossed western Cuba. The National Hurricane Center predicted it would strengthen into an extremely dangerous Category 4 hurricane, with top winds of 140 mph before making landfall along the U.S. Gulf Coast late Sunday.

Residents along Louisiana’s coast braced for Ida to bring destructive wind and rain on the exact date Hurricane Katrina devastated a large swath of the Gulf Coast exactly 16 years earlier. Katrina hit as a Category 3 storm with 125 mph winds.

“With a direct hit, ain’t no telling what’s going to be left — if anything,” said Ross Eichorn, a fishing guide on the coast about 70 miles southwest of New Orleans. “Anybody that isn’t concerned has got something wrong with them.”

A hurricane warning was issued for most of the Louisiana coast from Intracoastal City to the mouth of the Pearl River. A tropical storm warning was extended to the Mississippi-Alabama line.

New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell ordered the evacuation of everyone living outside the levee system that protects the area from flooding. She did not say how many people lived there, but urged residents with medical conditions and other special needs to get out early.

Officials warned they plan to close floodgates Saturday afternoon on two highways near New Orleans, increasing the sense of urgency for those planning to flee.

“Now is the time,” Cantrell said.