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Jet speed winds and heavy rains from the approaching powerful Hurricane Gustav began lashing the US Gulf coast early Monday, but its fury was greeted mostly by ghost towns.
Ahead of the killer storm hitting Louisiana and other gulf states, an estimated two million people had fled the area barring some diehards who plan to rough it out.
With lessons learnt from the chaos created by Katrina three years ago, the exodus, described as the largest evacuation in US history, was carried out by authorities smoothly.
Though still classified as a category three hurricane, Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal expressed confidence that the people of the area would brave the storm but added that those in capital Baton Rougue and other inland areas had been warned to watch for storm-spawned tornadoes.
Most people left the area by cars and some of the highways were jammed with bumper to bumper traffic. Besides Louisiana, New Orleans and other major towns, which had borne the brunt of Katrina's destruction, has been evacuated with only a few diehards in areas which were not flooded three years ago, braving to stay with supplies piled up to last several days.
The storm has so far killed 81 people as it lashed the Caribbean and three deaths were indirectly blamed in the US even before it struck three seriously sick dying while being evacuated in Louisiana.
Image: Rosemarie Jarreau and her son Devontay Jenkins hug their puppies at an emercency pet evacuation center before boarding the last Amtrac train to leave New Orleans, Louisiana, en route to Memphis, Tennessee on Sunday after a mandatory evacuation was ordered ahead of Hurricane Gustav.
Photograph: AFP/Getty Images