The Mardi Gras festival is underway early Tuesday morning in New Orleans.
According to the New Orleans Police Department, the city's iconic fat Tuesday parade will adapt to the imminent storm, with Zulu and Rex Cruises each shortening the route, starting earlier than usual at 6:30am and 9am.
Authorities have banned floats and marching bands due to concerns about strong winds.
All parades are to leave the streets by 11:30am
Police warn that the parade can be cancelled if conditions are guaranteed.
The National Weather Service issued strong wind surveillance across Louisiana's southern coast.
Forecasters said 30-40 mph winds are expected starting Tuesday morning, with gusts likely to be up to 60 mph.
New Orleans is also at level 3 of five severe weather threats, including the risk of damage to wind, h and even tornadoes.
The New Orleans Police Department said Monday afternoon that the Mardi Gras parade would be cancelled if gusts of wind were higher than expected and created dangerous conditions.
Meanwhile, officials from Jefferson, Louisiana, Parish, announced Monday that Tuesday's Mardi Gras celebration had been cancelled due to the threat of winds.
“We were told that with these wind timings, the winds would be expected early in the morning, so we couldn't consider moving to the previous parade time,” Shen said. “So, let me say something obvious. These are not conditions for us to invite our elderly and families, including children, to stand on our streets and go outside. These are not conditions for people to be promoted with floats. God forbids us to have float tips and there are people on the streets just below those floats.”
Shen also said strong winds could cause fragments to fly through the air, causing safety concerns.
“So I'm going to cut it into a chase with some very unfortunate news that you've already heard,” Jefferson Parish President Cynthia Lee Shen said at a press conference Monday. “We are in touch with the National Weather Service and we have no other option but to cancel tomorrow's scheduled parade, especially the weather with gusts of winds.”
This includes the Argas Parade crew and Jeffersonian Elk Crew, Shen said.
Located in the NWS New Orleans office We have created a special web page dedicated to updating weather for Mardi GRASand predictors expected the most important chance of rain coming from 6pm on Tuesday to 6am on Wednesday.
Fortunately, this timing allows most Mardi Gras festivals to end before the rainy weather moves.
Around a third of all Mardi Gras events usually see rainfall, but locals don't recall postponing or canceling a single instance of Tuesday Tuesday due to weather.
Climateologic data showed that the wettest Mardi Gras occurred on March 1, 1927 when precipitation was reduced by 2.12 inches.
The coldest Mardi Gras occurred in 1989 when the temperature dropped to 22 degrees.
City officials and organizers are closely monitoring the forecast, but at this point the spirit of watching the big easy can escape without intermittently intermittent the festival.
Locals say major sites around New Orleans tend to close early Tuesday evening as the city moves into cleanup mode for Ash Wednesday.
Unlike Easter, most Ash Wednesday services often take place after sunrise.
This means that the worst weather likely passed the New Orleans metro area by the time service began.
With the cold front moving, it will be comfortable on Wednesday, with highs of around 70 degrees and plenty of sunlight expected.
