Nearly two million people fled the Louisiana coast after New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin predicted that Hurricane Gustav would be the "mother of all storms".

In the event when Hurricane Gustav made landfall on 1st September west of New Orleans it caused less damage than expected, and the city's levees held.

But the authorities' prudence in declaring a mandatory evacuation was credited as the reason for the low death toll, with just six storm-related deaths.

Previously Gustav tore through Cuba, damaging 100,000 homes in the western province of Pinar de Rio.

See our Hurricane Katrina crisis briefing for background on the crisis three years ago.