Two people died and more than 80 were hurt when at least 140 vehicles collided on a Texas highway in dense fog.

Two people were killed and dozens of others injured today when at least 100 vehicles collided on a Texas highway in dense fog, leaving trucks twisted on top of each other and rescue workers rushing to pull survivors from the wreckage.

Sammi Kane Kraft, whose baseball skills earned her the role of a youth league pitcher in the 2005 remake of The Bad News Bears, has been killed in a car crash in Los Angeles car crash.

Howard Chenevert and Julie Morgan met at a staging area for evacuees of Hurricane Katrina beside Interstate 10 after floodwaters forced them from their New Orleans homes. They got to know each other on a bus ride to a shelter in Houston.

The damage inflicted by Hurricane Rita paled in comparison to Katrina, Texas Governor Rick Perry said today – but urged evacuees to stay where they are until local officials say it’s all right to return.

Residents along the Texas and Louisiana coasts began clearing away debris today as crews worked to restore electricity to more than one million customers in four states after Hurricane Rita tore through the US Gulf Coast, causing less damage than feared.

Hurricane Rita closed in on the Texas Gulf Coast and the heart of the US oil-refining industry with howling 145 mph winds, but a sharper-than-expected turn to the right set it on a course that could spare Houston and nearby Galveston a direct hit.

NEW ORLEANS’ mayor issued an urgent plea for relief of his flooded city on Thursday as gunshots and looting hampered the evacuation of desperate crowds trying to escape Hurricane Katrina’s destruction.

Fights and rubbish fires broke out, rescue helicopters were shot at and anger mounted across New Orleans today, as National Guardsmen in armoured vehicles poured in to help restore order across this increasingly desperate and lawless city.

With thousands feared dead and the city’s remaining residents told to evacuate for weeks, conditions deteriorated further in submerged New Orleans today as looting spiralled out of control.

Hurricane Katrina probably killed thousands of people in New Orleans, the city’s mayor said today.

Army engineers trying to plug New Orleans’ breached levees struggled to move giant sandbags and concrete barriers into place, and the governor said today the situation was growing more desperate and there was no choice but to abandon the flooded city.

Adam Nossiter, New Orleans

An immediate mandatory evacuation for the southern US city of New Orleans was ordered today as Hurricane Katrina bore down with winds up to nearly 175 mph and a threat of a massive storm surge.