Hurricane Laura has barrelled through south-west Louisiana in the United States, destroying buildings, flipping trucks, starting a fire and taking at least four lives.
Key points:
- Parts of Louisiana were decimated but Texas was largely unscathed
- The hurricane blew out windows in the large Capital One building
- The category four storm was packing winds of 240kph in the small town of Cameron
One of the strongest hurricanes to strike the US, Laura left entire neighbourhoods in ruins and more than 875,000 people without power and toppled a controversial Confederate statue.
A full assessment of the damage wrought by the category four system was likely to take days, but it did appear to be far is less than what forecasters predicted.
“It is clear that we did not sustain and suffer the absolute, catastrophic damage that we thought was likely,” Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards said.
“But we have sustained a tremendous amount of damage.”
He called it the most powerful hurricane to strike Louisiana, meaning it surpassed even Katrina, which was a category three storm when it hit in 2005.
The fatalities included a 14-year-old girl and a 68-year-old man who died when trees fell on their homes in Louisiana, authorities said.
Haiti and the Dominican Republic were both earlier badly hit by Laura, with at least 20 fatalities and severe flooding. Thousands of homes were damaged and there were extensive power cuts.
President Donald Trump said he would visit the Gulf Coast this weekend to survey the damage.
The hurricane’s top wind speed of 241kph put it among the strongest systems on record in the US.
Not until 11 hours after landfall did Laura finally weaken into a tropical storm as it ploughed north and thrashed Arkansas.
Confederate statue toppled, chemical plant set alight
The South’s Defenders Monument was also knocked off its pedestal as Laura swept through Louisiana.
Just days ago, officials in Louisiana’s Calcasieu Parish voted not to move the Confederate statue from its prominent place in front of the courthouse.
On Thursday morning, it could be seen lying on its side next to its still-standing base — broken tree branches strewn on the grass around it — as a steady stream of onlookers took photos.
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In Westlake, Louisiana, a chemical plant later caught fire in Laura’s wake, sending thick black smoke billowing into the sky over the wind-torn landscape near Interstate 10.
Mr Edwards warned residents in the area to close doors and windows and turn off air conditioners as authorities investigated.
“Stay inside and wait for additional direction from local officials,” he wrote on Twitter.