Hurricane Nate strikes southern coast of US

Hurricane Nate slammed into the U.S. Gulf Coast for the second time early on Oct. 8 after leaving a trail of death and destruction in Central America.

Officials urged residents to evacuate some vulnerable areas before the storm first made landfall on the southeastern tip of Louisiana on Saturday evening, and residents scrambled to make last-minute preparations ahead of the third hurricane to hit the region in less than two months.

Around 1:30 a.m. local time, the U.S National Hurricane Center (NHC) said Nate struck again about eight kilometers west of Biloxi, Mississippi, where storm surges caused sea levels to rise dramatically. But U.S. President Donald Trump said federal officials were ready for the fast-moving storm, urging residents of Alabama, Florida, Louisiana and Mississippi to “listen to your local authorities & be safe!”

The storm, a Category One hurricane on the five-point Saffir-Simpson scale, with winds swirling at 140 kilometers per hour was heading north at about 20 miles per hour, the NHC said.

Unlike Hurricane Harvey, which dumped record amounts of rain as it hovered over neighboring Texas for a week, fast-moving Nate was expected to pass through quickly along a northerly path.

When Nate struck Central America on Oct. 5 and 6, at least 31 people were killed and others were still missing.