On Thursday at 3:30 pm, an 80 mph tornado touched down in New Orleans, Louisiana, causing at least 30,000 power outages. The National Weather Service confirmed the tornado touchdown in 7th Ward, destroying half a mile section of the Tremé District. Beginning at Marias and Annette streets and ending at N. Claiborne Avenue and St. Phillip Street.
Firefighters and utility crews spent all Thursday responding to calls of downed power lines and fallen trees, and at the intersection of Annette and Henriette Delille streets, two poles were destroyed. Six houses were either destroyed or damaged, including N. Claiborne Ave. and Dumaine St., Claiborne Ave. at Ursulines Ave., St. Phillip St. at N. Claiborne Ave., 1326 Kerlerec St. and N. Villere St. at Ursulines Ave. according to NewsWest.
Only two victims were reported, with non-life-threatening injuries, and were transported to the nearest hospital by EMS. As of Friday morning, around one thousand homes were still without electricity. Meanwhile, the Department of Code Enforcement is analyzing the structural damage.
So far, the Sewerage and Water Board systems were efficiently operating. The North Claiborne Ave. St. Phillip St. at North Claiborne Ave. will remain closed until Friday afternoon. One citizen, Jim Ferrall, described how the tornado tore apart the building he saw from N. Claiborne like it was made ‘from tin foil.’ Ferrall proceeded to seek refuge in a funeral home.
The 2016 Atlantic Hurricane Season will last from 1 June to 30 November, and the Tropical Meteorology Project at Colorado State University warns there still ten named hurricanes for the remaining of the season.
“As is the case with all hurricane seasons, coastal residents are reminded that it only takes one hurricane making landfall to make it an active season for them. They should prepare the same for every season, regardless of how much activity is predicted” stated the Tropical Meteorology Project in a press release.
In the meantime, the monsoon season has left the states of New Mexico and Arizona in the midst of thunderstorms and intense rain.
As of this morning, the weather in New Orleans is sunny, with four mph winds and 84% humidity. However, it is expected that a thunderstorm might occur in the afternoon, with gusts of wind of 7 mph.
Hurricane Katrina
The 11th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina approaches. The storm, which started in the Bahamas on August 23, 2005, arrived in New Orleans on August 29, after crossing southern Florida.
The hurricane was one of the five deadliest natural disasters in the history of the United States, and the most costly, with $108 billion in damages and around 1,800 deaths, while the eighty percent of New Orleans flooded. Hurricane Katrina has only been topped by the Great Galveston Hurricane of 1900, that resulted in more than eight thousand deaths, and the 1928 Okeechobee Hurricane, with more than 2,500 fatalities.
After Katrina, the fourth deadliest storm is the Louisiana Hurricane of 1893 with 1,100 deaths and the 1893 Hurricane of South Carolina and Georgia, with one thousand casualties.
Source: The Independent