Hurricane Ida is expected to be one of the strongest storms to hit Louisiana since the 1850s, Gov. John Bel Edwards says

“This is a very large storm,” Edwards told reporters Saturday, noting that the hurricane could span about 150 miles east and west from the storm’s center.

“I don’t want folks who are further inland to be caught off guard.”

Over 4,000 soldiers and airmen with the Louisiana National Guard are currently mobilized and another 5,000 will be prepared by the time the storm makes landfall, Edwards told CNN Saturday afternoon.

“You just have a few more hours really to prepare,” Edwards said.

“Where you go to bed tonight, you need to be prepared to ride out the storm and the storm is going to be very severe,” he told those who are not evacuating.

‘An extremely dangerous major hurricane’

Ida is anticipated to reach at least Category 4 strength before landfall, the National Hurricane Center said, maintaining its earlier forecast. Tropical storm-force winds could reach New Orleans about 8 a.m. Sunday before the storm makes landfall that afternoon or evening west of New Orleans, near Houma and Morgan City. Late Saturday afternoon, meteorologists at the center said the storm appears to have begun its intensification phase.

“Ida is expected to be an extremely dangerous major hurricane when it approaches the northern Gulf Coast on Sunday,” National Hurricane Center forecasters said Saturday morning. At 2 p.m. ET, the storm had strengthened to a Category 2 hurricane with winds of 100 mph.

Officials throughout the state implored people to evacuate, with some issuing mandatory orders to do so. News footage from the area showed traffic backed up heading out of New Orleans.

Collin Arnold, director of the New Orleans Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness, urged people to stock up on enough food and water for at least three days — and to be either on the road or home by midnight.

“We say the first 72 (hours) is on you,” Arnold added. “The first three days of this will be difficult for responders to get to you.”

In text alerts Saturday, New Orleans officials urged residents to “leave by this morning if you can.”

“If you’re staying, gather supplies, charge devices, lower fridge temp & secure outdoor items today,” the message said.

State officials also texted residents: “Get ready for Ida.”

“Louisianans have until nightfall,” the text warned, adding that Ida will “bring serious impacts across the state.”

The storm surge, coupled with winds as strong as 150 mph, could leave some parts of southeast Louisiana “uninhabitable for weeks or months,” according the to the latest hurricane statement from the National Weather Service in New Orleans.

The statement warned of “structural damage to buildings, with many washing away” as well as winds that could bring “widespread power and communication outages.” Flooding rains could cause “numerous road and bridge closures with some weakened or washed out” along with “some structures becoming uninhabitable or washed away.”

Hurricane conditions are likely in areas along the northern Gulf Coast beginning Sunday, with tropical storm conditions expected to begin by late Saturday night or early Sunday morning. These conditions will spread inland over portions of Louisiana and Mississippi Sunday night and Monday.

Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves declared a state of emergency on Saturday.

Rainfall can amount to 8 to 16 inches, with isolated maximum totals of 20 inches possible across southeast Louisiana and southern Mississippi through Monday– which will likely lead to significant flash and river flooding impacts.

A hurricane warning remains in effect from Intracoastal City, Louisiana, to the mouth of the Pearl River and includes Lake Pontchartrain, Lake Maurepas and New Orleans.

In Louisiana, a tropical storm warning was in effect from Cameron to west of Intracoastal City and the mouth of the Pearl River to the Mississippi-Alabama border. Tropical storm warnings and watches are also issued stretching east to the Alabama-Florida border.

The storm has already idled about 90% of the oil production 84% of gas production in the Gulf of Mexico, according to the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement.

Mandatory evacuations were ordered for parts of at least seven Louisiana parishes as well as the town of Grande Isle and Port Fourchon. Voluntary evacuations were issued in six parishes.

New Orleans is anticipating impacts from damaging winds of up to 110 mph, according to Arnold.

“If you are going to evacuate, you know that’s a responsibility that you take on — do so as soon as possible,” he said. “You do not want to be stuck on the road, when the storms impacts arise.”

If Ida makes landfall in Louisiana, it would be the fourth hurricane to do so since last August and Louisiana’s third major hurricane landfall in that span.

“August 29 is an important date in history here,” Collins told CNN Saturday. “A lot of people remember what happened 16 years ago. It’s time to hunker down tonight and be where you need to be.”

In Washington, an administration official told CNN that President Joe Biden is “being briefed regularly on the storm’s trajectory.” Biden spoke with the governors of Louisiana, Alabama and Mississippi on Friday.

At a briefing Saturday with FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell, Biden urged those in the path of Hurricane Ida “to pay attention and be prepared.”

“This weekend is the anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, and it’s a stark reminder that we have to do everything we can to prepare the people in the region to make sure we’re ready to respond,” Biden said.

Ida raises health concerns amid Covid-19 pandemic

Hospitals in New Orleans will not evacuate and instead shelter in place while Ida makes its way through the region, the city’s health department director Dr. Jennifer Avegno said.

Capacity at nearby hospitals in Texas and Florida is “extremely limited,” Avegno said, as Covid-19 hospitalizations are on the rise. She added that the city’s hospitals are familiar with plans during storm season.

“I would ask our residents, if you do not need to go to the hospital this weekend, if you do not have a life-threatening emergency, please do not go,” Avegno said. “This is not the time to go to the hospital for a routine thing that could wait until later.”

Meanwhile, Louisiana had no plans Friday to separate vaccinated and unvaccinated people in shelters in state assisted emergency facilities during Ida, according to Mike Steele, a spokesperson for the state Homeland Security and Emergency Management.

Steele noted that municipalities issue evacuation orders, and those operations start at the local level. He added that masks are required at all shelters in the state along with social distancing.

Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards expressed concern about sheltering while Covid-19 are on the rise in the state.

“The prospect of sheltering potentially thousands and thousands of people at the height of the fourth surge is very, very daunting,” he said during a news conference about hurricane recovery efforts.

The governor acknowledged the challenge of bracing for a potential hurricane in the midst of recovery efforts from the 2020 hurricane season.

“We’re not recovered. Not by a long shot,” the governor said of Hurricanes Laura and Delta impacts last year. “We still have businesses boarded up from the last (hurricane.) Homes have not yet been repaired and reoccupied. Or if they are damaged to the point where they need to be demolished and removed, in many cases that hasn’t happened either.”

Edwards said there are currently 2,450 people hospitalized with Covid-19, more than “at any point before this current surge.”

“We had four hurricanes last year during Covid, but we had a small fraction of the number of people in our hospitals that we currently have,” Edwards told CNN Saturday. “When Hurricane Laura hit last year, we only had about 300 in the hospitals.”

Evacuating hospitals is not an option because there is “no excess capacity anywhere else in the state or outside the state,” he said.

Officials are concerned not only that hospitals could face prolonged power outages, but also worry about what capacity they would have for those who might be injured during the hurricane, according to Edwards.

Ida made two landfalls in Cuba Friday

Before entering the Gulf, Ida made landfall twice over Cuba as a Category 1 hurricane.

A second landfall occurred in western Cuba around 20 miles (30 km) east of La Coloma, according to satellite images, radar data and NOAA Hurricane Hunter data.

More than 4 inches of rain were recorded in Pinar del Rio, according to the Cuban Meteorological Institute. Jagüey Grande Matanzas experienced around 2.4 inches of rain and the Isle of Youth had 1.89 inches, the institute said. Havana recorded 0.94 inches.

Isolated instances of 5 to 15 inches of rain in some parts of western Cuba are expected, according to hurricane center forecasters.

“These rainfall amounts may produce life-threatening flash floods and mudslides,” the hurricane center said. Swells generated by Ida are expected to affect the western part of the island through Saturday morning.