Videos Show ‘Dangerous’ Hurricane Francine Battering Louisiana

Hurricane Francine made landfall in Louisiana Wednesday evening as a Category 2 storm, triggering widespread flooding, power outages and damaging wind speeds to the already fragile coastal area.
The National Hurricane Center (NHC) said the storm slammed into southern Louisiana around 5 p.m. EST near Terrebonne Parish, with wind speeds nearing 96 mph. By 11 p.m., forecasters said that hurricane-force winds had roared into the New Orleans area, and local news outlets reported instances of flash flooding.
NHC forecasters said in their update Wednesday night that there was “a danger of life-threatening storm surge” along the Louisiana and Mississippi coastlines in the hours following the hurricane’s landfall and urged residents to “remain in a safe location until conditions improve.”
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Videos circulated online of high floodwaters pouring into city streets as nearby trees and structures were ripped by the hurricane-force winds. In one video posted to X, formerly Twitter, meteorologist Jim Cantore of The Weather Channel was seen struggling to stand while getting battered by rain and wind during a broadcast from Morgan City, Louisiana, just after 6 p.m.
Another video posted by meteorologist Reed Timmer was taken from a vehicle traveling in New Orleans as the storm made its way north. In the clip, posted at 8:55 p.m., rushing water is seen engulfing the roadway, and heavy rainfall makes it difficult for the driver to see out his windshield.
“This is A Particularly Dangerous Situation,” veteran meteorologist David Bernard wrote to X later in the night.
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“One of the most significant floods in years is taking place across the New Orleans metropolitan area tonight,” he added in a separate post. “We don’t even know the extent of it because of the poor conditions.”
Emergency officials in Morgan City told the Associated Press that the hurricane caused rapid flooding and snapped power lines and trees in the city, which is roughly 30 miles north of where Francine made landfall.
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“It’s a little bit worse than what I expected, to be honest with you,” Morgan City Fire Chief Alvin Cockerham told the outlet. “I pulled all my trucks back to the station. It’s too dangerous to be out there in this.”
WeatherNation correspondent Erik Fox shared a video to his X account around 8:38 p.m. that showed search and rescue crews working to find residents in Houma, Louisiana, after a structure was toppled by the hurricane.
In a later report from WDSU in New Orleans, camera crews caught a “good Samaritan” rescuing a driver who was momentarily trapped in their pickup truck by rising water levels near the canal underpass.
The driver was seen crawling out the back window of their vehicle while another person, wearing all gray, helped pull him out. Emergency responders were spotted near the scene shortly after the driver was rescued.
“The person in the gray rain suit just saved that person’s life,” a WDSU host said during the report.
Francine is the sixth named storm of the 2024 hurricane season. Forecasters previously predicted this year to be an above-normal season, with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration forecasting 17 to 25 total named storms. Hurricane season in the Atlantic Ocean spans from the start of June through the end of November.
The storm is expected to continue north Wednesday night into Thursday, crossing over into central Mississippi and eventually reaching parts of Arkansas, Missouri and Tennessee by Friday evening, according to NHC’s predictions. Rainfall could top 4 to 6 inches in some parts of Louisiana and Mississippi as the storm rips through.
There is a moderate chance of flash flooding through Thursday morning around New Orleans, south-central Louisiana and into Mississippi up through Jackson, the NHC said in its forecasts Wednesday night.
Newsweek reached out to the Louisiana Governor’s Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness late Wednesday night for additional information.