UPDATE: Hurricane Ida now a powerful Category 2 storm; could be Category 3 storm on Sunday

By ALAN SMASON

After spending all day Saturday over the warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico, Hurricane Ida intensified its maximum winds to 105 miles per hour, establishing itself as a powerful Category 2 storm with hurricane force winds extending 30 miles out from its center and tropical force winds approximately 90 miles away.

Hurricane Ida intensifies in the Gulf of Mexico. (Satellite imagery from NOAA)

The storm is expected to continue strengthening tonight and forecasters believed it might cross the threshold to a Category 3 storm but it failed to do so by the 10:00 p.m. CDT update. The storm will continue to advance towards the Louisiana coastline in a northwesterly direction, expected to become an even more powerful and deadly Category 4 storm by early tomorrow morning. When it crosses Port Fouchon and Houma late on Sunday morning, the maximum sustained winds should be registering 130 miles per hour.

Storm surge associated with Hurricane Ida is expected to be between 10 and 15 feet at landfall in the River Parishes and at Grand Isle. Forecasters predict a surge between  7 and 11 feet on the North Shore of Lake Pontchartrain and along the Mississippi Gulf Coast. 

Residents of the protected levee areas in Orleans and Jefferson Parishes are expected to endure 24 hours of continuous battering of heavy winds and torrential downpours. Street flooding can be expected along with rain amounts of 10 to 15 inches in some areas over the time of the storm’s passage. 

At 10:00 p.m. CDT, the center of Hurricane Ida was located about 145 miles south southwest of the mouth of the Mississippi River at 27.2 N longitude and 88.0 W latitude and moving towards the coast at 16 miles per hour. Data released from storm hunter planes indicate a slightly lower pressure of 964 millibars of mercury, suggesting the storm is continuing to strengthen and that its wind strength will also increase.

New Orleans city officials have asked for a voluntary rather than a mandatory evacuation due to the lack of time to prepare in advance for contraflow and other measures. Those unprotected areas of Orleans and Jefferson Parishes outside of levee protection have been under a mandatory evacuation notice since Friday.