Some 1.1 Million People in US Without Power Due to Hurricane Ida - Energy Department

WASHINGTON, August 31 (Sputnik) - Approximately 1.1 million people in the United States - the vast majority in the state of Louisiana - do not have power due to damages caused by Hurricane Ida over the weekend, the US Energy Department said on Tuesday.

"As of 7:00 a.m. EDT on August 31, there are approximately 1.1 million customer outages due to Ida, with approximately 1 million outages in Louisiana," the Department of Energy said in a press release.

Ida made landfall in Louisiana on Sunday as a Category 4 hurricane, but downgraded to a tropical storm by Monday afternoon.

The rapid onset of storm surge from #HurricaneIda could be seen this morning from Grand Isle, Louisiana. If you're being told to shelter in place during a storm by local authorities, don't risk it, you could be overtaken quickly in a matter of hours as shown here. pic.twitter.com/oJ5WXYxNKM

— IntelWalrus (@IntelWalrus) August 29, 2021

​The release said that as of Monday afternoon, a majority of oil and natural gas production sites on federal territory in the US portion of the Gulf of Mexico continued operations at a limited capacity. Nine refineries in Louisiana shut down operations, accounting for 2.3 million barrels of oil per day, and they cannot restart until power is restored, the release added.

Ida is currently passing through the state of Tennessee with maximum sustained winds of 30 miles per hour, the release said. At least three people have died in incidents caused by the hurricane.