John Zarrella: Riding the storm out
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CNN's John Zarrella
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NEW ORLEANS, Louisiana (CNN) -- Tropical Storm Isidore, a sprawling system of wind and rain, rolled northward over New Orleans early Thursday, flinging rain storms north and east as far as 345 miles from its center.
Officials reported widespread flooding, saying rain was so heavy that the city's pumping system was not able to keep up. The rainfall total was 1 foot in some locations.
CNN Correspondent John Zarrella has been covering the storm's landfall from New Orleans' historic French Quarter and filed the following report:
ZARRELLA: You don't often see the city of New Orleans, particularly the French Quarter, deserted, but that's exactly how it is [Thursday] morning. ... The reason is because the mayor ordered a curfew from 10 p.m. local time to 6 a.m. local time to get the folks off the street because this is the time when Isidore is making landfall here in the Louisiana area.
Now you can't diminish this storm just because it's a tropical storm. There have been some serious effects from Isidore already. On Interstate 10 [on Wednesday] night, part of the highway was shut down because of serious flooding.
In fact, there were hundreds of cars stuck on the highway, some of them stuck in the floodwaters. All of the people stuck in the flood got out of their cars, left the highway and were rescued. Many of their cars ended up submerged in the water.
Shelters were opened. About 33 shelters remained open here throughout the night in the Louisiana area. But very few people took advantage of the shelters, most of them preferring to hunker down in their homes and ride it out.
Now a lot of people chose to ride it out in some of the bars near here. This bar just closed a little while ago. It's called the Corner Bar and Grill. Here they say they don't run from hurricanes, they drink hurricanes, and they partied past the curfew hours here in New Orleans and only left when the management finally kicked them out and closed down the restaurant.
But for the most part, reports are some storm surge flooding along Lake Pontchartrain, street flooding in the New Orleans area. But no reports of any serious injuries.
