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it has been 12 hours since i had a reuters sure in louisiana, on the 16th anniversary of hurricane katrina. but even as it has been downgraded from a hurricane for two hurricane one, over those 12 hours ida is wreaking havoc, especially from the storm surge it s leaving in its wake. authorities the last hour reported a levee failing about lafitte just south of new orleans and officials warn that more than 200 people are in intimate danger there and need to seek higher ground. one death has been confirmed elsewhere in the states, a 60-year-old man was killed when his house was hit by a fallen tree near baton rouge. and the entire city of new orleans is in the dark tonight s, the power companies say it s catastrophic transmission damage. the number of people without power throughout louisiana, is now more than 1 million, and rising. and there are fears that some of those people could remain without power for weeks. one area of particular concern tonight is louis knit loui ....
this is just some of the destruction in louisiana, that s about an hour south of new orleans. in new orleans, the french quarter was hit hard with significant damage. still dark there but as the sun comes up we ll have a better feel for things. in all, more than 1 million people there are without electricity. the power outage could make the area for susceptible to extreme flooding like we see in this video from grand isle, along the coast. joining us now jay gray. good morning, the power is out in new orleans, what does it look like this morning? reporter: willie, it is a mess right now. once we get some sunshine i think we ll see more problems in new orleans. but a break in the conditions, the winds dropped off, the rain thankfully after 16 straight hours has stopped. we have a chance to look at some of the devastation. you can see the roof top behind me pulled from a building thrown into the french quarter, bringing with it an elevated street sign. you can see the b ....
the worst. as soon as the storm passes, we ll put this, we ll put the country s full might behind the rescue and recovery. the help from the federal government and local crews will be needed. right now, a half million people in the new orleans area do not have power. joining us now to show the power of the storm, nbc news meteorologist bill karins and ali velshi. we can see the strong winds there. how is it on the ground? the signal is going in and out. we re trying everything possible. this is the way it goes right now. these are gusts. they re not sustained wind. as you can see, when they come in. what i m going through right now, it feels like microderm abrasion on my face. our viewers say what are you putting yourself in this danger for? there s a concrete wall there so i m completely blocked the the elements by a wall and from the hotel in front of me and this is still what i m getting. we re a couple blocks from the mississippi river here. so some of this may ....
let s go back to hurricane ida. our meteorologist tom sater is in the cnn weather center tracking the path. we re supposed to get an update from the national weather service. just moments ago, the 11:00 p.m. advisory is giving us interesting information. there is no change in the sustained winds that have been holding at 105. it s quite interesting because this has been over very warm waters, what we call the gulf of mexico loop, a stream of very warm waters. it hasn t changed its intensity. however, it s moving into much warmer waters. that s fuel and it s going to create intensification. the pressure, however, is dropping 2 millibars an hour. it takes a while for the winds to react to the dropping pressure. so it is strengthening. still a category 2. the new track has come out and it jumps from a category 3 to a category 4 by morning. there s your intensification. still looks to have landfall around midday, roughly a 1:00 p.m. hour central daylight time, local time. ....
follow i do want to track this story. we are, of course, following this potentially catastrophic hurricane barreling towards the u.s. gulf coast. within just the last few minutes, the ida was upgraded to a major hurricane. a category 3 storm. and is expected to rapidly intensify even more in the coming hours. it s forecast to pummel the the louisiana coast sunday as a category 4 storm now. both, mandatory and voluntary evacuations have been ordered for several louisiana parishes, as officials warn of these life-threatening situations. louisiana s governor is stressing the dangerous and historic threat of hurricane ida. what we re telling people is you just have a few more hours really to prepare because early-tomorrow morning, we re going to have the weather degrade rather rapidly. storm surge is going to be up to 15 feet, which is gonna test all of our protection systems down along the coast. this is just a very serious storm. it ll be one of the very strongest s ....