Clean-up after Hurricane “Ida”: Hundreds of thousands more without electricity

Hurricane Ida wreaked havoc in the US state of Louisiana. Two people died. Hundreds of thousands are still without electricity. It could take weeks for basic services to be restored.

Louisiana’s Governor John Bel Edwards prefers to start with the good news at the quick press conference with US President Joe Biden: “All of our levee systems,” says Edwards, “and the hurricane reduction measures have worked great.”

Relief. Because when hurricane “Katrina” hit land 16 years ago, large parts of the dykes failed. New Orleans was catastrophically flooded. This time, says Governor Edwards, it appears that most of the damage was caused by wind. That’s why more than a million people in Louisiana don’t have electricity.

Governor Edwards estimates that up to two million people could be affected. It’s still difficult to say. Due to fallen trees and debris on the streets, some towns could not be reached immediately. Sometimes cell phones and landlines did not work either, with which residents could have called for help.

25,000 special forces are to repair power lines

The emergency services – and around 5,000 national guards – now want to supply the hospitals with electricity again. Because many hospitals are full to the brim due to the corona pandemic, some could not even be evacuated. They run on emergency power generators. Around 200 additional generators had been brought into the state for power outages. The rest of the clean-up and reconstruction work in the disaster area will now take patience, says Jen Psaki, White House spokeswoman: It could take weeks before everything is back on track.

But more help is on the way: Around 25,000 special forces have been sent to the state to repair the power lines. And US President Biden announced that he had asked the Federal Aviation Association to work with the electricity suppliers in Louisiana and Mississippi: The aim is to use surveillance drones to better assess Ida’s damage to the electricity infrastructure. Biden also asked the Pentagon for satellite images.

Basic services not yet restored

At the same time, the Federal Communications Commission wants to ensure that telephone providers also make their services available to users of other providers so that everyone can receive telephone reception again.

Meanwhile, evacuated New Orleans residents have been asked not to return to their city until further notice. The basic supply has not yet been restored. The Red Cross has provided 50 emergency shelters in the coastal region for this purpose.