Louisiana and Mississippi took stock Tuesday of the disaster inflicted by powerful Hurricane Ida, as receding floodwaters began to reveal the full extent of the damage along the US Gulf Coast and the death toll rose to four.
New Orleans was under a curfew Tuesday evening, nearly two days after Ida slammed into the Louisiana coast as a Category 4 storm, exactly 16 years after devastating Hurricane Katrina – which killed more than 1,800 people – made landfall.
Four deaths have been confirmed as crews began fanning out in boats and off-road vehicles to search communities cut off by the giant storm. A man was also missing after apparently being killed by an alligator.
Mayor LaToya Cantrell said on Twitter she had signed an executive order mandating an overnight curfew in New Orleans, most of which was still entirely without power after the storm.
Images of people being plucked from flooded cars and pictures of destroyed homes surfaced on social media, while the damage in New Orleans itself remained limited.
New Orleans Airport said all incoming and outgoing flights scheduled for Tuesday were canceled, while airlines had scrapped nearly 200 flights on Wednesday.
One person was killed by a falling tree in Prairieville, while a second victim died trying to drive through floodwaters some 95 kilometers southeast in New Orleans, officials reported.
Ida knocked out power for more than a million properties across Louisiana, according to outage tracker PowerOutage.us, most of which still out Tuesday evening, leaving residents without air conditioning in late summer.
But power provider Entergy told New Orleans City Council members Tuesday morning that some electricity could be restored as early as Wednesday, the New Orleans Times-Picayune reported. The first to see power would likely be hospitals and sewage and water treatment centers, the paper reported, saying it could still be days before average customers were reconnected.
Sandbags are piled up at the door of a supermarket to prevent possible flooding caused by Hurricane Ida in New Orleans, Louisiana, the United States, on Aug. 29, 2021.(Photo: Xinhua)
