Below The Beltway

It turned out that Hurricane Gustav wasn’t quite the storm of the century that many feared:

NEW ORLEANS — This nearly deserted city appeared to have escaped threats of full-scale devastation on Monday when Hurricane Gustav came ashore 70 miles to the southwest, bearing winds and rain far less formidable than earlier forecast.

The storm smashed through the bayou country of rural Louisiana, raising fears of widespread coastal erosion and damage to fishing villages that state officials were unable to confirm Monday evening. But before making landfall, it was downgraded from a Category 3 hurricane to Category 2 when its winds slowed to 110 miles per hour, from 115 m.p.h., and state officials said they believed that their worst fears had not been realized.

Hurricane Gustav weakened to a tropical depression early Tuesday as it moved over central Louisiana, though officials said that it remained a flood threat. Early Tuesday, it was 135 miles northwest of Lafayette, La., and moving toward the northwest. It was forecast to move into northeast Texas late Tuesday.

The levees in New Orleans were tested by a heavy storm surge but held, even though the repair and reconstruction work from Hurricane Katrina, is far from finished. In Hurricane Gustav’s wake, waves pounded against a floodwall on the Inner Harbor Navigation Canal, considered a particularly weak link.

Though the water lapped over the wall for hours, there was only ankle-to-knee-deep water on the streets it was protecting, on the edge of the Ninth Ward, a neighborhood that was hit hard after Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

So, good news it seems, although residents are being told not to start rushing back home just yet:

New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin urged residents not to return to the city on Tuesday, but instead to give emergency workers time to assess the damage.

“The city of New Orleans looks like we are not totally out of the woods, but we are getting close,” Nagin said Monday night.

He said trees were down all over the city and the sewer system was not fully functional.

All in all, Nagin seems to have redeemed himself this time around. Although I think it helped having a Governor who actually knew what they were doing.

As Gustav winds down, though, there’s another storm named Hanna that seems likely to become an issue by the end of the week:

MIAMI, Florida (CNN) — Hurricane Hanna’s path and strength remain uncertain, but the latest forecast map from the National Hurricane Center predicts it could make landfall as a major hurricane on the southeastern U.S. coast by Friday evening.

Hanna’s path early Tuesday appeared to be a “meandering” loop across the Turks and Caicos Islands, but atmospheric changes over the western Atlantic are expected to steer the storm northwestward over the next two or three days, according to forecasters.

As of 5 a.m. ET on Tuesday, Hanna was a Category 1 storm on the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Scale with sustained winds of 80 mph (129 kph) and gusts of up to 100 mph.

While the hurricane center forecasters said “only modest changes in intensity are anticipated” over the next day or two, Hanna is expected to gain strength before landfall.

Hanna’s line of fire could include the U.S. Atlantic coast from Miami, Florida, to Massachusetts, according to the hurricane center’s long-range forecast map. Charleston, South Carolina, appears in the middle of this “cone of uncertainty,” with Hanna potentially making landfall there Friday.

“It appears that the center has been meandering,” forecasters said.

The history of hurricanes that have been where Hanna is now might argue against its heading toward the southeastern United States. None of the September storms that passed within 200 miles of the current location has gone there, with most heading into the Gulf of Mexico and others going to New England or Nova Scotia.

And, as of this morning Hanna has been downgraded to a Tropical Storm, meaning that it could fizzle out before coming anywhere near the cost.