Hurricane Gustav is the 3rd of the 2008 hurricane season, and as it heads out into the Gulf of Mexico it is already being described as this years’ Katrina.

Hurricane Gustav formed on the 25th August and has raced across the Atlantic and exploded from a tropical storm to a category 4 hurricane in just 12 hours.

Saffir-Simpson Hurricane categories:

Cat 1: Winds 74-95mph, storm surge 4-5ft

Cat 2: Winds 96-110mph, storm surge 6-8ft

Cat 3: Winds 111-130mph, storm surge 9-12ft

Cat 4: Winds 131-155mph, storm surge 13-18ft

Cat 5: Winds over 155mph, storm surge over 18ft

Gustav claimed 80 lives even before it had reached Cuba, having tracked across Haiti, Jamaica and the Dominican Republic. The storm struck Cuba’s mainland at Pinar Del Rio with wind speeds of almost 150mph. Although Gustav naturally weakened over the Cuban mainland it is expected to intensify over the Gulf of Mexico as it moves towards the US mainland. Hurricanes feed off the warm ocean and that is why so many storms intensify as they pass over the warm waters of the Gulf.

Currently Gustav’s projected path is across the oil rich Gulf and making landfall somewhere along the Louisiana coast on Monday, sparking a mass evacuation as the memories of Katrina in 2005 are still very fresh. Katrina killed over 1,800 people and the US government were criticised for a slow and disorganised evacuation. They are taking no such chances this time with Mayor Ray Nagin describing Gustav as the ‘storm of the century’.

Parts of New Orleans are protected by a levee that is just 10ft high, so a storm surge that could be over 20ft high would once again devastate the city. An extensive waterway designed to protect New Orleans (the Harvey Canal) has not yet been completed so a surge through Lake Pontchartrain would put at risk large areas of the city once again.

It seems that the residents of New Orleans are taking the Mayors’ words seriously. Hundreds of thousands have already left the city with the roadways jammed and the petrol stations emptied of fuel. There was also reportedly a line of residents a mile long queuing to take buses to shelters further North.

Meanwhile Gustav, as always happens with Hurricanes tracking across the Gulf, has caused the price of oil to rocket. On Thursday the price for a barrel passed the $120 mark, although it did settle below this level as the US government is likely to utilise the ‘Strategic Petroleum Reserve’ should oil production be disrupted by the storm.

But it isn’t just New Orleans that needs to be prepared for Gustav. The path of a hurricane is notoriously difficult to predict and the storm could hit any part of a wide area of the Gulf coast. A hurricane watch is in force along the coast from Texas all the way over to the Alabama-Florida border.

The next couple of days will be crucial in the life of Gustav and the millions in its path. Fortunately there were no reported deaths in Cuba, but many injured, so let’s hope that the US evacuation is successful and that we have learnt the lessons of Katrina before Gustav explodes across the Gulf.