Hurricane Gustav prompts US coastal evacuation

01 September 2008 12:13  [Source: ICIS news]

LONDON (ICIS news)--Hurricane Gustav will hit the US Gulf coast on Monday with 100 miles/hour-plus winds and storm surges up to 14 feet above normal, forecasters said.

 

The category three storm has led to hundreds of thousands being evacuated from the coast, including New Orleans, Louisiana, which was largely devastated by Hurricane Katrina three years ago.

 

In total, an estimated 1.9m people are thought to have fled further inland.

 

At 09:00 GMT, the hurricane was situated about 115 miles (185km) south-southeast of New Orleans, moving northwest at around 16mph.

 

The centre of the storm was predicted to cross the Louisiana coast by 12:00 local time (17:00 GMT) on Monday, said the National Hurricane Center (NHC).    

 

It said the storm had sustained winds of around 115mph and this was unlikely to change significantly before it made landfall.

 

“An extremely dangerous storm surge of 10-14 feet above normal tidal levels is expected near and to the east of where the centre of Gustav crosses the coast,” said the NHC.

 

A hurricane warning was in place from just east of High Island, Texas, eastward to the Mississippi/Alabama border.

 

Crude oil values gained more than $1/bbl on Monday as energy companies in the US Gulf shut down operations in anticipation of the threat.

 

The region's largest offshore producer, Shell Oil, along with fellow producers ExxonMobil and Chevron have shut down their facilities in the Gulf and evacuated workers from the area which accounts for about a quarter of the US’ oil production.

 

ExxonMobil’s refineries in Baytown and Beaumont, Texas, and in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, were reported to have cut production.

 

The Mineral Management Service (MMS) on Sunday estimated that around 96.26% of Gulf oil production had been shut in as well as about 82.3% of natural gas production.

 

The storm has forced the cancellation of some events at the Republican National Convention in St Paul, Minnesota, including speeches by US President George Bush and Vice-President Dick Cheney, as they focus on its possible impact.

 

John McCain, due to accept the party's presidential nomination at the convention, reportedly travelled to Mississippi on Sunday to monitor preparations for the hurricane.

 

Hurricane Gustav has already killed more than 80 people in the Caribbean as it passed through Haiti, the Dominican Republic and Jamaica.

 

                                                    

                               

 

(National Hurricane Center image shows path of Hurricane Gustav)

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By: Graeme Paterson
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