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Video shows dolphin swimming in Hurricane Ida floodwaters

Residents warned to look out for alligators in the floodwaters following Category-4 storm

Kelsie Sandoval
in New York
Wednesday 01 September 2021 22:32 BST
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Dolphin seen swimming in Hurricane Ida floodwaters

A family captured on a video a dolphin swimming in Louisiana floodwaters after Category-4 Hurricane Ida made landfall this past weekend, bringing 150mph winds and several feet of storm surge.

While Amanda Huling was scoping out hurricane damage in Slidell, a town around 30 miles northeast of New Orleans, she noticed a dolphin swimming through the neighborhood.

“It’s right there!” a voice can be heard saying on the short video clip.

According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, bottlenose dolphins inhabit the Gulf coast region.

Hurricane Ida slammed into southeastern Louisiana on Sunday. Although experts say new levees, constructed in the wake of 2005’s Hurricane Katrina, prevented major flooding in New Orleans, neighboring cities experienced significant water damage.

In Jean Lafitte, 22 miles south of New Orleans, the mayor said that more than 150 people were stranded by flooding.

The small town isn’t protected by New Orleans’s levees and some roads, bridges, and neighborhoods are inundated with water.

In Slidell, Mayor Greg Comer said residents should look out for alligators which may swim into the city’s flooded streets.

On Monday, a 71-year-old man in Slidell was attacked by an alligator and is presumed to be dead.

More than a million people remain were left without power following the storm which caused at least seven deaths.

Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards has told people who were evacuated not to return to their cities until infrastructure is restored.

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