Hurricane Katrina
– the worst of its kind to hit America – has slammed into the Gulf
Coast just outside New Orleans, submerging entire neighbourhoods,
swamping Mississippi’s beachfront casinos and blowing out windows in
hospitals, hotels and high-rises, reports Yahoo News.

With
winds of up to 145mph it hasn’t been the apocalyptic storm forecasters
feared for New Orleans – dangerously vulnerable because it sits mostly
below sea level in a bowl-shaped depression. But it was still serious
enough to have killed five people (although recent reports
say deaths have reached 15, and even 55) — three by falling trees in Mississippi and
two in a traffic accident in Alabama – with an untold number of others
feared dead in flooded neighbourhoods, many who could not be reached by
rescuers because of high water.

Latest reports say Katrina has
weakened to a Category 1 storm with 95mph winds and is moving north
through Mississippi, still causing plenty of damage and possibly
sparking mini-tornadoes.

Katrina could be the most expensive hurricane ever to hit the US, says blog DeadlyKatrina.com, not least of all for the impact it will have on oil prices, says The New York Times, and on US insurers. Not to mention the environmental damage, says MSNBC – Katrina could turn New Orleans in to a toxic cesspool.

Meanwhile, America’s media goes into Hurricane mode, with several reporters throwing caution to the wind, says MediaBistro’s TVNewser,
to get the money shots. But it all pays off – Katrina has tripled
traffic to CNN.com. And in the blogosphere, bloggers everywhere, like punditguy.com are responding to the biblical-scale menace of Hurricane Katrina, says Slate. Also worth a look, CNN’s Hurricane blogger, and for amusement only, watch a CNN weatherman crack under the pressure of the storm.