Isaac Makes Landfall

An unwelcome visitor to the Big Easy

Hurricane Isaac hovered over the Gulf Coast on Wednesday morning, punishing southeast Louisiana with 80 mile per hour wind gusts, driving, horizontal rain and the threat of calamitous flooding.

Forecasters said the rainfall may not let up for days.

The hurricane, which made its second landfall early Wednesday, was essentially stationary just off the Louisiana shore, according to the National Weather Service, bringing with it the heightened risk of tornadoes and flash flooding hundreds of miles inland from Louisiana, and across Mississippi and Alabama to Florida.