Several southern states may have to prepare for a hurricane. Tropical storm "Ida" is expected in Cuba beforehand – and should gain strength.
Baton Rouge – In the Caribbean, a dangerous tropical storm is approaching Cuba and the US Gulf Coast. The US Hurricane Center (NHC) issued a hurricane warning for the states of Louisiana and Mississippi on Friday night (local time).
According to the forecasts, the tropical storm "Ida" will gain strength over the Gulf of Mexico at the weekend and could then hit the US coast as a hurricane on Sunday evening, it said. "Ida" was early Friday morning with sustained winds of 65 kilometers per hour over the Cayman Islands in the western Caribbean, announced the NHC. From there, the storm will move further north-west at a speed of around 19 kilometers per hour and will later move across western Cuba. The authorities there warned of heavy rainfall and life-threatening storm surges.
In Louisiana, Governor John Bel Edwards declared a state of emergency. "Although I hope and pray that the storm will not bring destruction to our state, we should be prepared for the force of the storm," he wrote on Twitter. dpa
