By AccuWeather staff writer
Published Aug. 31, 2021 11:53 AM EDT | Updated Sep. 1, 2021 6:01 AM EDT
Two days after Hurricane Ida slammed into the Louisiana coastline near Port Fourchon as a Category 4 hurricane, the true scope of Ida's destruction was just starting to be revealed.
At least six deaths have been attributed to the storm across the South, including two killed Monday night near Lucedale, Mississippi, where seven vehicles plunged into a 20-foot-deep chasm after a highway collapsed during torrential rains, The Associated Press reported. According to NBC News, the two most recent fatalities were two electric workers who were repairing power grid damage in Alabama.
AccuWeather National Reporter Bill Wadell, reporting from just outside Houma, Louisiana, which is about 50 miles to the southwest of New Orleans, saw roofs ripped off homes and debris littering the streets. With wireless service in the area barely working and power out across Houma, survivors and loved ones were struggling to make contact with each other.
In New Orleans, residents in leveed areas of the city celebrated the success of the federally constructed levees that protect the city from experiencing a Katrina-like flooding event.
"For the most part, all of our levees performed extremely well, especially the federal levees," said Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards.
Several feet of water still covered a highway through LaPlace the day after Hurricane Ida's landfall, and homes and businesses throughout the city lay in ruins.
Levees protecting smaller communities outside New Orleans did fail, though, sending a wave of water into parts of Plaquemines Parish, where residents were urged to evacuate late Sunday after a levee failed in Alliance, about 20 miles south of New Orleans. In the small town of Jean Lafitte, also south of the city, a levee failure "devastated" the city, according to Tim Kerner, the mayor.
"We’ve lost our school, everything,” Kerner told WGNO. “But now with people’s lives ... it’s turned into a total rescue mission. People’s lives, I believe, are at stake now and we’re trying to get to them as fast as we can." Kerner added that as soon as the weather breaks, "we’re going to send an army to them.”
In LaPlace, Louisiana, which is about 30 miles west of New Orleans and tucked between Lake Pontchartrain and the Mississippi River, floodwaters and high winds devastated the town, leaving some residents to plead for help on Twitter, with families waiting hours in their attics to get rescued from the rapidly rising waters, NBC News reported.
Drone footage from LaPlace showed floodwaters in some parts and homes with second floors sheered right off, the type of structural damage that rivaled what is often seen after powerful tornadoes.
Sheila Brown, a LaPlace resident, spoke with AccuWeather's Kim Loeffler about her experience with Ida's wrath. Brown escaped rising floodwaters with her family by retreating to her attic, where she waited six hours for the water to recede.
"It was kind of scary there for a while, we thought maybe our roof was going to give way and just take off," Brown said. "It was a good relief when I heard the helicopters circling around, and then I heard the boats."
Government rescue crews and citizens using their own resources saved entire communities stranded in LaPlace by flooding from Hurricane Ida.
Paul Middendorf, a private citizen, said he helped to rescue more than 60 people in LaPlace using his personal boat.
"I'm very tired," Middendorf said. "It's everyone waving from windows, waving from holes they punched in their roof."
Rescue efforts continued into Tuesday, but as of late Monday at least 200 people had been rescued from floodwaters by members of the National Guard in Louisiana, the governor said. In some cases, National Guard personnel were ushering people back into the flood zone.
That was just the case for Jerilyn Collins, who was escorted by the Louisiana National Guard back to her flooded home in LaPlace on Monday so she could recover some personal belongings and essential medicines for herself and her father. They had evacuated as floodwaters rose during the storm, according to the AP.
Aerial imagery taken August 30th shows a bridge is destroyed in Jean Lafitte, LA NOAA
Back in New Orleans, officials warned that power could be out in Orleans Parish for weeks, and local institutions are making plans accordingly. Tulane University announced plans to evacuate its campus of all remaining students and take them to Houston. The school will not resume in-person instruction until Oct. 11, according to reporting from NOLA.com.
Meanwhile, even though sunny blue skies had returned to much of coastal Louisiana by Monday afternoon, signs of the long road to recovery that lies ahead were abundant.
Residents in and around the city were also seeing very long lines for gas and food, with lines at gas stations with fuel and groceries with generators stretching around blocks.
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Almost one million residents across Louisiana were still without power early Wednesday morning, according to figures from PowerOutage.us. In Mississippi, nearly 30,000 residents still had power cut. The lack of power and air conditioning could prove dangerous, as temperatures across the areas directly impacted by Ida rise.
AccuWeather RealFeel® Temperatures are expected to hover at or above 100 degrees Fahrenheit into Wednesday in Houma and New Orleans.
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