Edwards said in a statement Saturday that Sally is expected to strengthen into a hurricane that could make land fall in Louisiana Monday morning.

“While we ultimately don’t know where Sally will make landfall, much of Southeast Louisiana is in the storm’s cone and the risk of tropical storm force or hurricane strength winds continues to increase,” Edwards said, The Hill reported.

Tropical Storm Sally formed Saturday off Florida’s coast in the Gulf of Mexico, the National Hurricane Center (NHC) said. Sally comes on the heels of Hurricane Laura, which slammed Louisiana as a Category 4 storm in late August, killing at least 28 people.

“Barely two weeks ago, Louisiana suffered a devastating blow when Hurricane Laura came ashore as the strongest hurricane ever to make landfall in Louisiana history, leaving a trail of destruction in its path,” Edwards said. “This, when combined with the COVID-19 pandemic, can make us all weary.”

Sally is one of several storms swirling in the Atlantic Ocean, according to NOAA. Tropical Storm Paulette is forecasted to strengthen into a hurricane and move over or near Bermuda by Monday morning.

El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele declared a state of emergency for 15 days to cope with the effects of the storm, which weakened later in the day as it moved into Guatemala.

The fatalities were all recorded in El Salvador, interior minister Mario Duran said, warning that the death toll could rise.

Amanda knocked down trees, triggered flash floods and landslides, caused power outages, and damaged about 200 homes, the head of the Civil Protection Service William Hernandez said.

One person is still missing, senior government official Carolina Recinos added.

San Salvador Mayor Ernesto Muyshondt said half of those killed died in the capital.

“We are experiencing an unprecedented situation: one top-level emergency on top of another serious one,” he said, referring to the coronavirus pandemic, AFP reported.

About 4,200 people sought refuge in government-run shelters after losing their homes or being forced to leave because they were in high-risk areas, Muyshondt added.

In some flooded areas, soldiers worked alongside emergency personnel to rescue people.

“We lost everything, we’ve been left with nowhere to live,” said Isidro Gomez, a resident of hard-hit southeastern San Salvador, after a nearby river overflowed and destroyed his home.

Another victim, Mariano Ramos, said that at dawn residents of his San Salvador neighborhood were slammed by an avalanche of mud and water. An elderly man died in the area, officials said.

El Salvador’s Environment Ministry warned residents of the “high probability” of multiple landslides that could damage buildings and injure or kill people.

Nearly 90 percent of El Salvador, population 6.6 million, is considered vulnerable to flooding and landslides due to its geography.

In neighboring Guatemala, officials said roads had been blocked by at least five landslides and some flooding was reported, but no evacuations were underway.

Even though Amanda weakened to tropical depression status, Guatemalan officials warned that heavy rain would continue, with swollen rivers and possible “landslides affecting highways … and flooding in coastal areas.”

The storm headed out to sea but the region will stay cold this week, the National Weather Service’s (NWS) Weather Prediction Center said, Reuters reported.

“This remains a dangerous system even as it moves off the coast,” said lead NWS forecaster Michael Schichtel. “It’s slow to move off the Carolinas but a saving grace is that it won’t hit New England.”

One motorist died outside Charlotte, North Carolina, on Sunday, and divers searched for a driver whose 18-wheeler was found in a river in Kinston, North Carolina, a NBC affiliate in Raleigh reported.

Motorists in north Georgia, the Carolinas and Virginia can expect snow and ice on Monday.

More than 300,000 customers were without power in the Carolinas, Tennessee and Virginia, Poweroutage.us reported.

The storm prompted more than 1,000 flight cancellations at Charlotte/Douglas International Airport, the sixth-busiest airport in the country, and other airports across the region, according to flight-tracking website Flight Aware, early Monday.

North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper said on Sunday a state of emergency would remain in effect and the North Carolina National Guard had been activated to help with the response.

The storm hit the state capital Kolkata and its adjoining areas, Xinhua news agency reported.

A large number of trees and electric poles along the roads were uprooted and traffic disrupted, said the sources. Power supply was also disrupted in a large number of storm-hit areas.

While five deaths were reported from Kolkata, two were reported from Bankura district and one from Howrah district.

Traffic was disrupted in several places as the uprooted trees fell on main roads. The local government has been pressed into service to carry out relief and rescue work.

Kai-Tak, packing gusts of up to 100 kilometers (62 miles) an hour, was poised to smash into the north of the country’s third-largest island Samar overnight Saturday before slicing across the central Philippines, the state weather service said.

More than 38,000 people have moved to evacuation camps, local officials said, after days of heavy rain unleashed by the approaching cyclone caused floods and landslides on Samar and nearby Leyte Island, AFP reported.

These islands, with a combined population of about 4.5 million, had borne the brunt of Super Typhoon Haiyan four years ago, which left more than 7,350 people dead or missing.

Ferry services on the two islands remain suspended due to rough seas, with three fishermen also missing despite government warnings against sailing, the region’s civil defense office said.

“Major hurricane force winds” were expected over the Florida Keys at daybreak Sunday, the National Hurricane Center said. The storm is expected to cause life threatening storm surges of up to 15 feet along parts of southwestern Florida and storm surges on other parts of the coast, forecasters warned.

More than 201,000 customers were without power in Southern Florida late Saturday, Florida Power & Light said on its website.

Earlier Saturday, Florida Gov. Rick Scott warned, “If you have been ordered to evacuate, you need to leave now. This is your last chance to make a good decision.” Scott called Irma a “catastrophic and life threatening” storm, NBC news reported.

Nearly 6.3 million people were ordered to evacuate ahead of the storm. Not everyone heeded the calls.

Brian Cone, a boat captain in Tavernier in the Florida Keys, said he is staying at home, which he said is built of cement and which he compared to “a bunker.”

“Truthfully, the whole state of Florida is in trouble. I mean, there’s really nowhere safe,” Cone told MSNBC in a phone interview. He said he and his neighbors have generators, batteries, food and water and other supplies.

“We feel it was more dangerous to travel all over the state, run out of fuel possibly … We’re gonna ride it out,” Cone said.

The National Hurricane Center said at 8 p.m. that “heavy squalls with embedded tornadoes” were sweeping across Southern Florida. A tornado touched down near Fort Lauderdale Saturday evening, the National Weather Service said. The fire department said there was no damage or injuries.

Key West Police Chief Donald Lee told MSNBC by phone Saturday that those who stayed in defiance of evacuation orders do so at their own risk. He said the area had already seen tornado warnings, downed trees and flooding by Saturday evening, and the storm could be devastating.

“They’re putting their lives in danger,” Lee said.

In Miami-Dade County in the southeastern part of the state, police encouraged residents to stay indoors as the storm was hitting early Sunday.

“There’s a lot of trees that are being knocked over, we have live wires — it’s extremely volatile out there,” Miami-Dade Police Department Major Hector Llevat said. “Right now, we’re just urging everybody to stay indoors, to seek shelter.”

Scott cautioned that the storm will cause “life-threatening” surges as high as 15 feet in southwest Florida. “This will cover your house,” Scott said, adding, “You will not survive all this storm surge.”

The hurricane center warned of a storm surge of up to 10 to 15 feet between Cape Sable and Captiva if they peak at high tide, and storm surge of up to 5 to 10 feet in the Keys. Tampa Bay could see surges of up to 5 to 8 feet.

Florida Power & Light warned Friday it was expecting “unprecedented” power outages that could affect about 9 million people.

Many of Florida’s communities had become ghost towns by Saturday. In Plantation, just inland from Fort Lauderdale, the once busy streets had gone quiet, and the only sounds were the quickening winds pulling at the trees and the occasional car passing by.

Juan Carlos Lorca, 42, who has lived in Florida for 25 years, took a stroll ahead of the hurricane to get some fresh air earlier Saturday. Lorca, a construction worker, said he was quick to prepare for the storm when he first heard about it: boarding up his windows, picking up cash from the bank, and buying water, gas, ice, food and — most importantly — wine and beer.

“I should not be here,” he said. “But I wanted to get some fresh air. By 2 p.m., everyone should be back in their home.”

“What I see on the news,” he added, “that is very wrong if people are still on the beach.”

Nevertheless, despite the governor’s warnings and the increasingly dangerous circumstances, people still gathered on beaches to take photos earlier Saturday.

While some remained home, many attempted to seek refuge at shelters, but were having a tough time getting in. Thousands in Lee County on Florida’s west coast, waited in lines that snaked down the block for up to five hours, as officials attempted to check in residents. Many decided to evacuate or head for the shelters once Irma shifted to the west.

Hurricane Irma has already claimed at least 23 lives after smashing through a string of Caribbean islands this week, including Barbuda, St. Martin, the US Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico, where 1 million people were left without electricity.

Nicole Reid and her boyfriend were riding out the hurricane in a house in Miami Saturday night. She said that other people in coastal areas were under mandatory evacuation orders and gas was hard to come by.

“It kind of made sense to stay put, stay secure, stay safe and let the people that really needed to get out, get out,” she said in an interview with MSNBC. If things get bad, they plan to go to other taller concrete buildings in the area.

Scott said Florida has been “aggressive” in its preparation for Irma, adding that there were more than 385 shelters open across the path of the storm. More than 70,000 Floridians have taken shelter already, he said, adding that “there is still room for more.”

Scott said Florida has a shortage of nurses to deal with the hurricane’s aftermath and urged volunteers to come forward. He asked for about 1,000 to help at various shelters. In Collier County, which includes part of the Everglades, more than 11,800 people were housed in 30 shelters. Nurses were flown in overnight from Texas to help.

On Friday, Irma, which had been a Category 5, slammed into Cuba’s northern coast. The Cuban Civil Defense had evacuated about 1 million people and there were widespread reports of home and infrastructure damage and loss.

Scott warned this week that Irma is on track to be “bigger, faster and stronger” than Hurricane Andrew, the devastating Category 5 storm that caused major damage in the state a quarter-century ago.

Meanwhile, north of Florida, states were also preparing for Irma’s arrival. In Georgia, 540,000 residents were told to leave the coast, while in South Carolina, nearly 45,000 people were ordered to evacuate.