ST LOUIS - Republican White House hopeful John McCain and his running-mate Sarah Palin were to make an unplanned visit to Mississippi to inspect preparations for the arrival of Hurricane Gustav, his campaign said Saturday.
"It's to show his concern," press secretary Brooke Buchanan told reporters. "It's a category five at this point and gaining speed."
McCain and Palin are set to meet Mississippi governor Haley Barbour at the state's hurricane command center in the state's inland capital of Jackson.
Gustav, packing winds of 150 miles an hour (200 kilometers) is on course to slam into the US Gulf Coast near New Orleans.
It will hit almost exactly three years to the day after Hurricane Katrina obliterated whole areas of the city, leaving some 1,800 people dead across the region.
New Orleans mayor Ray Nagin late Saturday ordered a mandatory evacuation of the city from 8:00 am (1300 GMT) Sunday morning, saying Gustav was "the mother of all storms."
"We want everybody ... we want 100 percent evacuation. If you decide to stay, you are on your own," he warned.
"This storm is so powerful and growing more powerful every day that I'm not sure we've seen anything like it."
McCain chose not to visit New Orleans because he did not want to divert resources from the evacuation, Buchanan said.
The candidates will leave at 9 am (1400 GMT) and be back in time for a scheduled rally in Missouri Sunday night.
Republicans are still haunted by the disaster wreaked on the Gulf Coast region in 2005, when thousands were left stranded for days without food or proper sanitation and the administration of President George W. Bush was angrily criticized for failing to act in time.
McCain said that his party may have to suspend its nominating convention next week because of Gustav.
"We may have to look at that situation and try and monitor," McCain said in an interview to be broadcast in full on Fox News Sunday.
"It wouldn't be appropriate to have a festive occasion while a near tragedy or a terrible challenge is presented in the form of a national disaster.
The convention will crown John McCain as its official presidential candidate in the November 4 elections, to take on Democrat Barack Obama who made history last week when he was nominated at the party's Denver convention as the first black presidential candidate for a major party.
McCain asked a rally of 10,000 flag-waving supporters in Washington, Pennsylvania to pray for the people of the Gulf Coast.
"They need to know -- and I know that they know -- that they're in our thoughts and prayers as this impending hurricane approaches," he said Saturday before boarding a plane to Missouri.
"And we pray to God that it will spare them and a minimum of loss that might result from this natural disaster."
mso-jkb/mk
08/31/2008 03:27 GMT