Will Gustav be harder on Louisiana than Katrina?

Question

I'm a LA resident, and I want the opinions of other people living in the southern states such as la, texas, florida, and mississippi. It sure looks like its going to be tough...Baton Rouge (and myself) are on the east side this time. Atleast Jendal has his c**p together. Blanco was an idiot :/

Answer 1

since Katrina has already weakened New Orleans and residents have not had time to fully recover, i believe that Gustav will be a critical blow.  i want to believe otherwise...

please be safe and evacuate at the first opportunity you get.  i lived in la when two cat 3 hurricanes were supposed to hit within a week of each other... luckily, they were downgraded to tropical storms before they hit.  i stayed for the first one and  evacuated for the next because enough was enough.

i never believed it until i moved there, but louisiana is worse than florida when it comes to the # hurricanes that threaten them.

Answer 2

idk yet but I'm from the southern states and idk how hard it will hit i just hope it wont be horrible like Katrina

Answer 3

I think this could spell trouble for all of LA, especially New Orleans, because my understanding is that many people have yet to fully recover from Katrina. I agree with James, Gustav doesn't look good. It looks like it's going into that warm water where both Katrina and Rita rapidly intensified. I'm actually from PA, but friends have lived in the south and experienced these storms.  

Answer 4

There won't be nearly as many deaths, but the destruction could be similar. Flooding will occur if the levies break, but with an OVERexaggerated force of some 10,000 government workers (which is what it should have always been) the flooding will be quickly repaired. The storm is moving quicker than Katrina as well. The main difference though will be the reduced number of deaths.

Answer 5

Well I don't live down south ( I live in New York City), but I'll help you out anyway. I have studied about hurricanes for a long time and I don't like the looks of Gustav. Besides, I am friends with some people from the south and my dad experience a lot of hurricanes when he was a child.

In this time of year, it is when the waters of the gulf of Mexico are at their highest temperatures. Once Gustav passes over Cuba, it can easily and a lot of people are expecting it to become a catergory four hurricane. However, if the gulf loop is present and the storm goes over it, it can get to a very strong cat. 4 or even a categerory 5 storm, but hopefully it won't be able to get near a category 5 strength.

The way the current storm track is, the center of the storm may land east of Batan Rouge (don't worry, I know where the cities are in LA because a friend of mine is from Lousiana), but that is not necesarrily a good thing. The reason why the storm may go west of where Baton Rouge is due to to a high pressure system, but it is most likely going to slow the storm down once it gets near the gulf coast. If the storm slows down enough and the eye is still over the gulf of mexico, it may take a while for the storm to weaken. Also, if you get hit with the northeast portion of the hurricane, its the worst part of the storm outside of the eye wall. That northeast sector has heavy rains, the strongest winds outside the eye wall (due to the counterclockwise circulation of the hurricane) and also produces the most tornadoes if a hurricane will actually produces tornados. However, since Baton Rouge happens to be inland, you will have to worry about inland flooding, winds and tornados, but at least the storm surge can't effect Baton Rouge.

The one thing I am concerned about are the levees. I really don't have too much confidence in them since they haven't finished working on them, and if I am not mistaken, the levees are not too much stronger than the original ones. But the one thing I'm glad to see is that they are more cautious this time in Louisiana compared to when Katrina was coming and hopefully they learned from their mistakes. And I do agree with you that so far it looks like Jendal is doing a lot better job than that moron Blanco ( I believe Blanco should be in jail for her immense amount of foolishness and stupidity when it came to dealing with Katrina).

Lastly, with Gustav, I don't think it won't be worse than Katrina since people are prepared this time, but any hurricane that is at least a category three or higher is something to be concerned about and can cuase an extensive amount of damage. But I am praying that Gustav will not be as bad as katrina and that no hurricane will ever be worse than Katrina.

Take care and I hope and pray that the residents of Louisiana, Texas, Mississippi, etc won't have to deal with too much damage and that there that is a minimal to no amount of casualties from the storm.

- James