Surprise Hurricane Rips Louisiana Coast

Hurricane Juan surprised the Louisiana coast Monday, strafing the length of the state’s shoreline and killing at least three persons, stranding dozens of oil rig workers in angry Gulf of Mexico waters and spilling torrential rainfall that flooded lowlands and trapped hundreds.

The storm’s 85-m.p.h. winds, coupled with three days of rain, caught everyone off guard. On Sunday afternoon, the disturbance was still a tropical storm, but it quickly grew in strength, whipping up 20-foot-high waves in the gulf that flailed boats and crushed oil rigs.

During the night, an oil rig with five men on board was destroyed when a huge wave rolled over it. But in a near miracle, all five men aboard were rescued Monday. The last man was found floating in waters near the site of the rig about 3 p.m., at least 12 hours after the steel structure was smashed.

Training Paid Off

Coast Guard spokesman Debbie Westerberg said the dramatic survival of the five men was attributable to the training they had received.

“They’ve been taught to hold their heads above water for a long time,” she said. “And the water isn’t that cold this time of year.”

On two other rigs off the coast, another drama began unfolding late Sunday night when one of them broke its moorings and slammed into the other. Eighty-four men were aboard the Penrod 60 and Penrod 61 rigs when they collided. About midnight, the crewmen climbed into two “unsinkable” pods and a lifeboat and were buffeted by the storm through the night.

30-Foot Waves

Carl W. Colson, a roughneck who was in one of the pods, said that waves 25 to 30 feet high pounded the capsules, which are airtight and designed not to sink in even the worst weather.

“It was scary as hell,” he said after a Coast Guard helicopter plucked him and the others from the pods and the lifeboat and flew them to the safety of shore. But Westerberg said that one of the 84 men was killed, although she had no details.

Marshall Ballard, a spokesman for the Penrod Oil Co., said that because the storm turned so rapidly, there was no time to evacuate the rigs before the hurricane hit.

Westerberg said the Coast Guard and other civilian boats rescued 146 people Monday, many more than in the two other hurricanes to hit the Louisiana coast this season.

“Everyone was informed that the others were coming,” she said. “With this one, it turned around and caught us off guard.”

Minimal Strength

Neil Frank, the director of the National Hurricane Service in Miami, said it was fortunate that the storm was a late season hurricane, with the cooler waters of the gulf keeping it at minimal strength.

“If we had had a true, classical hurricane right along the coast, it could have been disastrous,” he said. “This is bad enough.”

Among those who thought it bad enough were the people who live on Grand Isle, just off the Louisiana coast. With three days of heavy rains before the hurricane arrived, those who stayed had no chance of getting to the mainland because the roads were already flooded. An estimated 1,200 people were stranded there.

Juan--the 10th tropical storm of the year--was stalled about 30 miles offshore. The National Hurricane Service said it should remain stationary through the night. Hurricane warnings were posted from Port Arthur, Tex., east to the mouth of the Mississippi River.