Tropical Storm Rita is heading toward the Florida Keys and the Gulf of Mexico today with forecasters expecting it to strengthen into a hurricane.
New Orleans mayor Ray Nagin during a press conference yesterday. Photo: Reuters
All 80,000 residents were ordered out of the Keys yesterday and Miami-Dade Mayor Carols Alavrez cautioned southern Florida not to dismiss the power of the coming storm.
"Tropical Storm Rita is a serious threat. Do not underestimate this storm," he said. Schools, many government offices and some businesses were closed today.
A Louisiana official warned that levees in New Orleans, where hundreds died in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, would fail again if the city were smashed by a new storm surge and the city ordered residents to leave.
New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin yesterday suspended a plan to bring residents back and told all those now in the stricken city to leave because of fears that Rita could swamp the damaged levees and wreak havoc.
Oil companies only starting to recover from Katrina began to evacuate Gulf oil rigs. Private forecasters said there was a 40 per cent chance that damaging hurricane-force winds would directly affect major Gulf energy production areas.
Rita was expected to become a major hurricane today with sustained winds of at least 178 kph as it drew strength from warm Gulf waters after passing over or near the Florida Keys today, the US National Hurricane Center in Miami said.
Rita's center was about 255 km east-southeast of Key West, Florida, at 5 am, (10am Irish time) and was moving toward the west-northwest at about 24 kph, forecasters said. It was expected to continue on this path for the next 24 hours.
The Hurricane Center cautioned that Rita could still veer north to the Miami area, home to 2.3 million people. Miami-Dade County officials urged residents to evacuate mobile homes, barrier islands and flood-prone areas, and long lines formed at petrol stations as motorists filled their tanks.
Key West resident Christelle Orr
In the Florida Keys, military cargo planes evacuated the Keys' three acute-care hospitals. Some residents, reluctant to leave the laid-back islands, were confident Rita would hit them as a Category 1, the lowest rung on the five-step scale of hurricane intensity.
"The stores are all boarded up but it's open, everybody's very mellow. The tourists are all gone," said Key West resident Christelle Orr yesterday.
"We may be crazy (not to evacuate) but I mean it's not like Louisiana, you know, we're not under water."
Rita would be the seventh hurricane to hit Florida in the last 13 months. A hurricane warning was in effect for all of the Florida Keys and the southeast and southwest coasts of the state, alerting residents to expect hurricane conditions within 24 hours.