People fill sandbags to prepare for Hurricane Nate in Mississippi. Credit:AP The storm's swift approach startled this stretch of the Gulf Coast, where many had hoped they might be able to slip through the grips of this wrenching hurricane season. Officials had repeatedly warned residents to take the storm seriously, in a repeat of a drill that caused thousands of evacuations from Louisiana in August. As the storm continues north, a second landfall is likely to occur along the Mississippi or Alabama coastline later Saturday evening. By early evening Saturday, Nate had maximum wind speeds of 144 km/h and threats of storm surge up to 3.3 metres. Mandatory evacuations were put in place for parts of New Orleans, and communities across Mississippi and Alabama opened shelters for residents.

Louisiana resident Jarmar Gross, right, holds a bag as a prison trustee fills it with sand in preparation for Hurricane Nate. Credit:AP Nate has already been blamed for at least 25 deaths in Central America as it swept through the Gulf of Mexico last week. It is the ninth hurricane to form in the Atlantic this season, which is the highest total since the infamous 2012 season that featured Hurricane Sandy. In New Orleans, where Hurricane Katrina exacted a horrendous toll when its waters overwhelmed the flawed levee system and left the city underwater for weeks, officials began to sound a note of cautious optimism Saturday evening. Officials lifted the city's short-lived curfew around 9.30pm. An enhanced satellite image from National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration of Hurricane Nate. Credit:AP

"This is the Goldilocks of storms," Colonel Michael Clancy, the commander of the New Orleans District for the Army Corps of Engineers, said. "Big enough to bring us in here on a Saturday night, not big enough to cause a lot of damage." The strength of the city's improved hurricane defense system, he predicted, "is going to make this a minimal event, at least behind the levee." At the 17th Street Canal between New Orleans and Metairie, Louisiana, workers from the Army Corps of Engineers lowered a set of enormous gates at the mouth of the canal. On Friday, divers checked the beds that the gates rest on to make sure they would be able to close. 8am simulations from the American GFS model show landfall along the Alabama coast at the most likely scenario. Credit:NCAR In 2005, there were no gates there or at the three other major canals in New Orleans. Katrina's surge pushed water from Lake Pontchartrain into the canals. When levees along those canals breached, much of the city was inundated and stayed underwater for weeks, until the breaches could be closed and the neighbourhoods pumped dry. The corps later acknowledged the hurricane protection system it built was "a system in name only."

Now the corps is building permanent pumping stations at the very end of these canals. Until then, a structure of gates and temporary pumps has been built to protect nearby neighbourhoods. Mayor Mitch Landrieu of New Orleans said at a news conference Saturday that he expected the city's pump system to function effectively. Of the 120 pumps, 108 were working. "We have plenty enough to deal with the potential rain," he said. "Everything that we can see, we think we can handle." The city could be without power for as long as a week, officials said. As for the question of how protective the city's $14.6 billion system of levees, flood walls and gates would be against Nate, Landrieu expressed cautious optimism. "There is limited or no risk for storm surge in the city of New Orleans," he said. In the afternoon, as Nate's outer bands hit New Orleans, rain pounded the streets, pushed by heavy gusts. Pedestrians took off running or huddled under overhangs.

Nia Johnson, 23, who lives on Alvar Street a few dozen blocks from the Mississippi River, said that she and her family had planned to pile into the car and drive to Lafayette, Louisiana, because the streets of her area "always flood." The power would almost certainly go out because of the high winds, she said, leaving them unable to cook for days. Loading Many of the larger chain establishments in the French Quarter had closed. But along Bourbon Street, the daiquiri and pizza-slice joints were open, and music spilled out of bars like the Beach, where customers wearing fleur-de-lis-covered ponchos were drinking and watching college football. New York Times