Delta has been downgraded from a hurricane to a tropical storm a day after it came ashore in the US.
The National Hurricane Center in Miami said Delta arrived in southwest Louisiana on Friday evening as a Category 2 hurricane with top winds of 100mph but quickly weakened to a tropical storm.
It still inflicted destruction on communities in places such as Lake Charles, which was still recovering from Hurricane Laura, which killed 27 people across Louisiana six week ago.
Homes were damaged in the city of Lake Charles, Louisiana
Debris from Laura still lined the streets and the city’s mayor Nic Hunter said Delta had ripped tarpaulins from homes across the city.
He said: “I’m in a building right now with a tarp on it and just the sound of the tarp flapping on the building sounds like someone pounding with a sledgehammer on top of the building.”
Jeanne-Marie Gove, in Lafayette, about 75 miles (121km) east of Lake Charles, stayed in the area during Laura and chose to hunker down again during Delta.
She said she could hear debris hitting the front door of her home on Friday night, describing it as “much worse than what Hurricane Laura brought”.
Roads were flooded in Baker, Louisiana, as the storm approached
“The wind gusts are making the glass from our windows bow inward,” she added. “It’s pretty scary.”
Delta caused power cuts in Louisiana and Texas for 600,000 homes and businesses early on Saturday, while almost 40,000 properties had power cuts in Mississippi.
By Saturday morning Delta’s maximum sustained winds were 60mph and it is expected to be downgraded further to a tropical depression as it moves across northern Mississippi into the Tennessee Valley.
Delta was the fourth named storm to strike Louisiana in 2020: Tropical Storm Marco fizzled as it hit southeast Louisiana just three days before Laura. And Tropical Storm Cristobal caused damage in southeast Louisiana in June.