125,000 Flee as ‘Major Hurricane’ Heads for Gulf Coast

More than 125,000 persons from Florida to Louisiana fled their homes and headed inland Thursday as fast-growing Hurricane Elena swept toward the Gulf Coast with 95-m.p.h. winds and high tides.

Forecasters warned that the hurricane would strike land early today with winds of up to 100 m.p.h. and 12-foot storm tides.

The governors of Mississippi, Louisiana and Florida declared a state of emergency in two dozen counties along the Gulf Coast, where up to 10 inches of rain were forecast.

Gale-force winds from the leading edge of the storm, which Louisiana Gov. Edwin W. Edwards called “a major hurricane,” began striking the coast about midnight Thursday, and a hurricane warning was in effect from Morgan City, La., to Pensacola, Fla.

Schools closed early in southern Louisiana and Mississippi, and Civil Defense officials opened emergency shelters. Bumper-to-bumper traffic jammed roads leading inland.

Rising tides covered roads in Louisiana’s St. Bernard Parish, and floodgates were closed along Lake Pontchartrain, where National Guardsmen and sheriff’s deputies stacked sandbags.

“People are panicking and heading inland,” said Carol Barnette of the Mobile County, Ala., Emergency Management Agency. “Traffic is backing up, gas stations are full, and grocery stores are packed. People are scared.”

Authorities said that more than 125,000 persons from Florida’s Panhandle resorts to the Louisiana bayous were heading for higher ground.

Thousands of tourists canceled Labor Day reservations at beach resorts. “It’s a heartbreaker to have this weekend disappear like this because of the storm,” said Allen Dean Jr., who manages a Holiday Inn at Pensacola Beach, Fla.

Helicopters were used to fly thousands of oil company employees from offshore rigs.

Bayous and other waterways along the southeast Louisiana coast were clogged with boats as oil workers in the path of the storm secured their coastal rigs.

“We’re just waiting for the worst,” said Dorothy Bielstein, of the Civil Defense office in Bay St. Louis, Miss. “We’re getting ready for a long night.”

On Grand Isle, a vulnerable seven-mile strip of sand just off the Louisiana coastline, residents who packed their belongings just two weeks ago to escape Hurricane Danny began to evacuate again.

“We’re boarding up everything and tying everything down,” Grand Isle Mayor Tommy Marullo said.

The storm was upgraded from a tropical storm to a hurricane at 9 a.m. after its winds exceeded 75 m.p.h.

Early today, it was about 285 miles southeast of New Orleans and was moving northwest at 10 m.p.h.

Forecaster Mark Zimmer of the National Hurricane Center said that the eye of the hurricane would probably reach shore around the mouth of the Mississippi River.

Astronauts watched the hurricane from the orbiting space shuttle Discovery on Thursday, and commander Joe Engle said that it looked like the hurricane could develop into a “real whoomer.”

Hurricane Elena, the fifth named storm of this year’s Atlantic hurricane season, developed with unusual speed and crossed the ocean from the Cape Verde Islands off Africa faster than any storm in the memory of experts at the hurricane center, forecaster Bob Case said.

Zimmer said that meteorologists were impressed by the storm’s ability to maintain its strength even as it passed over the mountainous islands of Hispaniola and Cuba, which usually break up weather systems.