Aug 31, 2008 - UPDATED: 12:05 a.m.
"Hurricane Gustav, which churned into the Gulf of Mexico late Saturday night and early today, could produce coastal Louisiana flooding as bad as Hurricane Katrina, Gov. Bobby Jindal said Saturday.
"This storm can be as bad as it gets," Jindal said during a news conference.
He warned that Louisiana would begin feeling high winds and heavy rains much earlier than the predicted landfall.
Jindal said the storm is churning toward the Louisiana coast at a tilt, making it hard to predict a precise time for landfall.
A tilt to the right would put the storm in Louisiana six hours earlier than expected while a tilt to the left would delay the hurricane by 12 hours, he said.
Jindal also accelerated the start of contraflow and pleaded with people in coastal parishes to evacuate.
Lanes on the major arteries in southeast and southwest Louisiana will run in one direction only, beginning at 4 a.m. today, two hours earlier than originally planned. The evacuation will mark the first time the state has attempted contraflow in both parts of the state at the same time.
Many parishes started mandatory evacuations Saturday as Hurricane Gustav swept across Cuba as a Category 4 storm with maximum winds of 145 miles per hour.
The track puts New Orleans and southeast Louisiana on the eastern side of the hurricane, which typically unfurls the strongest winds.
Tidal surges could reach 20 feet, Jindal said.
The hurricane’s so-far steady journey toward central Louisiana prompted officials to bump up the time of contraflow.
State Police Superintendent Col. Mike Edmonson said he needed the extra time to move people out of the storm’s path. He is calling on 900 officers to direct motorists to north Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas.
From the southeast, drivers trying to reach Baton Rouge must take Interstate 10 or U.S. 190 West. From the southwest, the route to Baton Rouge is I-10."
http://www.2theadvocate.com/news/27708449.html
