On August 29th, Louisiana was hit by a category four hurricane called Hurricane Ida. The storm began on August 26th in the Caribbean Sea as a category two. Cuba was hit the next day. This storm recorded wind speeds of 150 mph. It was almost a category five, which is the highest class recorded. Hurricane Ida surged on the coasts of Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama. It had such a strong surge that it caused the Mississippi river to temporarily reverse its flow.
A 150-mph category four storm has more than 250 times more damage than a category one storm. Both southern Louisiana and the north east experienced a great amount of damage. Thousands of people lost their power and sewage was backed up. This caused citizens to have to evacuate. Recovery from this could take days or maybe even weeks. Since the street lights did not have power, they enforced a curfew in New Orleans for 8:00 pm. The city was lacking food, which caused stores to be looted. People could not get their children the essentials needed to care for them. So much damage was done to these places and the people that lived there, many even stated that it was worse than Hurricane Katrina.
So far, there have been more than eighty deaths that were caused by Hurricane Ida. Most of the deaths took place in the northeast region of the United States. As Hurricane Ida moved inland, it arched toward the northeast and brought downpours, flooding and tornadoes to areas from Kentucky to New Jersey. Some of the areas experienced never before seen events, such as flash flooding in New York City. Because the events were unexpected, many people lost their lives. Some people living in basement apartments drowned when flash flooding entered their apartments so quickly they didn’t have time to get out.
Global warming which is causing our climate to change is leading to more severe shifts in weather patterns. It’s important that we lessen our contribution to warming our atmosphere while at the same time prepare for a new normal.
Sources: nytimes, wsj
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