Weakened hurricane hits Gulf coast

Hurricane Gustav crashed into a mainly-deserted US Gulf coast as a slightly weakened Category 2 storm today.

An estimated two million people fled the state of Louisiana over the weekend as the hurricane headed towards New Orleans, just three years after Katrina devastated the city.

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Residents mainly heeded the warnings of its mayor that "the storm of the century" was coming and it was "time to be scared".

The eye of the storm landed south west of the city, which resembled a ghost town today.

Gustav hit land near the community of Cocodrie, the heart of Louisiana's fishing and oil industry, just before 10am local time (4pm BST), the US National Hurricane Centre said.

Forecasters once feared it would arrive as a devastating Category 4 hurricane, with much more powerful winds.

Three years ago, Katrina killed more than 1,800 people after it smashed the Gulf coast with an epic storm surge that topped 27ft, a far higher wall of water than Gustav hauled ashore.

Katrina was also a bigger storm when it made landfall in August 2005, and it made a direct hit on the Mississippi coast.

Gustav skirted along Louisiana's shoreline at "a more gentle angle", National Weather Service storm surge specialist Will Shaffer said.

Harvey Johnson, deputy director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, said: "We don't expect the loss of life, certainly, that we saw in Katrina.

"But we are expecting a lot of homes to be damaged, a lot of infrastructure to be flooded, and damaged severely."

Gustav will test New Orleans' levee system, which has only been partially rebuilt since Katrina struck. It was not expected to be completed until 2011.

Colonel Jeff Bedey, commander of the Army Corps of Engineers' hurricane protection office, said: "We are seeing some overtopping waves. We are cautiously optimistic and confident that we won't see catastrophic wall failure."

Tens of thousands were without power in New Orleans and other low-lying parishes, but officials said backup generators were keeping city drainage pumps in service.

Initial reports indicated storm surge from Gustav of about 8ft above normal tides, but forecasts indicated up to 14ft in surge was possible.