National Weather Service warns of flash flooding as Francine batters New Orleans area

The storm weakened after landfall, but floodwaters, power losses and dangerous roads kept the New Orleans region on alert.

The National Weather Service issued a flash flood emergency for New Orleans and nearby communities as Hurricane Francine stalled enough over Louisiana to dump dangerous rain, according to the evidence packet for this event.

The supplied source says Francine made landfall in Terrebonne Parish as a Category 2 hurricane before weakening to a tropical storm later on Wednesday. Even after the downgrade, the system still produced hurricane-force wind gusts in the New Orleans area and left flooded roads, downed power and dangerous conditions across southeast Louisiana.

The packet says the emergency covered New Orleans, Metairie and Kenner, and that officials told people to move to higher ground immediately. It also notes flooding approaching homes in Mandeville, across Lake Pontchartrain, and floodwater in the Greenleaves neighborhood of St. Tammany Parish.

The storm’s impacts were broad. The source says more than 340,000 customers were without power in Louisiana, with Entergy accounting for the bulk of the outages. The blackout had knock-on effects for sewerage pump stations in New Orleans, where officials told residents to conserve water.

The report also shows how quickly a hurricane can turn routine roadways into life-threatening traps. WDSU video captured a pickup truck entering deep floodwater near an underpass and getting stuck, while a bystander broke a rear window and helped the driver escape. The National Weather Service repeatedly warned against driving into floodwater, using the familiar message to turn around and not drown.

Public institutions reacted quickly. LSU, Tulane, Xavier and other schools moved to remote instruction or closed campuses because of the storm. That broad response reflects how much disruption a storm can still cause even after it loses hurricane strength.

The packet also describes public-safety issues beyond wind and rain. New Orleans officials said cell carriers had resolved earlier problems reaching 911, and the city warned residents to conserve water because of pump-station issues tied to outages. Those are small details individually, but together they show how a storm stresses multiple systems at once.

The verified point is not that Francine remained a hurricane at the time of the emergency. It is that the storm, after weakening, still produced enough rain and flooding to justify an urgent warning for the New Orleans metro area and left tens of thousands of homes and businesses without power.