New Orleans Begins Preparations as Hurricane Gustav Threatens

Eerily close to the third anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, Hurricane Gustav is presently predicted to come ashore near New Orleans early next week. Preparations are already underway in city terrified of history repeating itself. The current 5-day forecast has Gustav arriving at the "boot" of Louisiana at 8:00 a.m. Monday, September 1.

Governor Bobby Jindal gave a radio interview yesterday on WRNO telling citizens that it was too early to be sure that Gustav was headed to New Orleans, but that they should start preparing anyway. He said the government would make a determination on evacuations when the storm was 72 hours out, but that people should make arrangements to travel right now. He also commented that if Gustav hits Louisiana, he will not be speaking at the Republican National Convention as scheduled.

A trip to the local Wal-Mart last night revealed the state of tension in the local population. With the storm at least 5 days away, the store was already sold out of "D" cell batteries and flashlights, hoping to restock in the next day or two. A manager at the local Home Depot told me that they are anticipating a run on plywood, generators, and chain saws over the next couple of days.

While the vast majority of the damage to the city of New Orleans came from post-Katrina flooding, the North shore communities of Mandeville, Covington, Lacombe, and Abita Springs are a different story. These communities are more rural and heavily wooded and, while there was no flooding on the scale of New Orleans, the wind damage made the streets impassible and kept the power out in some areas for a month. Houses were destroyed throughout the area by 60-foot pine trees being thrown around like matchsticks.

In a random interview, I spoke with Randy Smith of Kenner, Louisiana. When I asked him what he planned to do if the storm was headed to New Orleans he said, "My girlfriend and her family are already making arrangements to get out of town. I think I'm going to stay put, though. I've already stocked up on bottled water and I already have my generator with extra fuel, so I can run a fridge and a box fan. I'm probably going to ride it out."

Driving around Mandevlle today, I've seen people getting their homes ready by clearing the debris from their rooftops. If Gustav remains on its current path, the plywood boards will start going up on windows by Saturday. It seems people aren't taking any chances this time.