Hurricane Ivan slammed ashore early yesterday with winds of 209kph, packing deadly tornadoes and a powerful punch of waves and rain that threatened to swamp communities from Louisiana to the Florida Panhandle.
For the millions of Gulf Coast residents who were spending a frightening night in shelters and boarded-up homes, the worst could be yet to come: up to 38cm of rain and a storm surge of up to 4.8m.
"Say a prayer, say a prayer, say a prayer, that I'll have some place to go when I leave here," evacuee Betty Sigler said in a shelter in the city of Mobile, safe from the howling wind and sheets of rain. "We'll see in the morning."
The storm weakened as it moved inland, with winds of 185kph about two hours after it hit land.
Ivan knocked out power to hundreds of thousands of people, toppled trees and sent street signs hurtling through the night. In Gulf Shores, where the storm's eye blew ashore, the sky had a bright green glow as electrical transformers blew.
"We have never seen a hurricane of this size come into Alabama," said Governor Bob Riley, who earlier asked US President George W. Bush to declare much of the state a disaster area, a request that was granted.
Two people were killed and more than 70 homes were damaged when at least five tornadoes roared through Florida's Bay County.
"We have a report from a deputy that it looks like a war zone," Bay County sheriff's spokeswoman Ruth Sasser said.
Four ailing evacuees -- a terminally ill cancer patient, two nursing home patients and a homebound patient -- reportedly died after being taken from their storm-threatened south Louisiana homes to safer parts of the state.
Max Mayfield, the director of the National Hurricane Center in Miami, warned that the misery would spread as Ivan moves across the Southeast in the hours and days ahead.
"I hate to think about what's going to happen inland," he said.
At 5am, Ivan was centered about 65km northwest of Pensacola, Florida, and was moving slightly east of north at 22kph.
A hurricane warning for New Orleans was lifted early Thursday, but one remained in effect from the mouth of the Pearl River to Apalachicola, Florida.
A hurricane warning was in effect from Grand Isle, Louisiana, including New Orleans, to Apalachicola, Florida. Hurricane-force winds extended out 169km from the Category III storm, which earlier killed at least 68 people across the Caribbean.
An 11th-hour shift spared New Orleans a direct hit, but Ivan's sheer size could create catastrophic flooding in the bowl-shaped city. Officials warned that the levees and pumping stations that normally hold back the water may not be enough to protect the city, which is nestled mostly below sea level.
At least 200,000 homes and businesses were without power in Alabama, 36,500 in Louisiana, 45,000 in Mississippi and 21,000 across northern Florida -- a state still trying to restore power to more than 100,000 hit by Hurricanes Charley and Frances in recent weeks.
Ivan's waves -- some up to 7.5 meters -- destroyed homes along the Florida coast Wednesday. A buoy about 480km south of Panama City registered one wave of 15m high.
David Bodenhamer, the mayor of the resort town of Gulf Shores, said streets were flooded and trees and power lines were down everywhere. His home and others along the beachfront road were OK, "But the beach is going to be a mess, a big mess," he said.
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