The U.S. Census Bureau estimates that about 2.9 million people live within a 100-mile radius of Mobile, Ala., a large city close to where Hurricane Ivan is projected to make landfall sometime early Thursday.

Overall, an estimated 15.9 million residents of Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana and Mississippi could experience tropical storm-force winds – extending outward 290 miles from the hurricane’s eye – before the center of the massive storm reaches the Gulf Coast shore. In the initial impact zone, Hurricane Ivan’s destruction could span across six states, nearly 300 counties and more than 1,350 cities.

According to the National Hurricane Center’s latest advisory (4:00 p.m. CDT), the highest probabilities of landfall occur near the Mississippi-Alabama border between Mobile and Pascagoula, Miss. A hurricane warning is still in effect along the Gulf Coast from Grand Isle, La. (south of New Orleans), to Apalachicola, Fla. (southwest of Tallahassee).

Hurricane Ivan is the fifth hurricane of the 2004 Atlantic season, but the first to threaten states other than Florida with shores along the Gulf of Mexico. According to the National Hurricane Center, Ivan packed maximum sustained winds of about 135 mph, making it a large Category 4 hurricane. Hurricane-force winds extend 105 miles from the center of the storm.

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Note: The above calculations are based on projections of the storm’s path from the National Hurricane Center, a part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) National Weather Service, Census 2000 counts contained in LandView 6, a mapping software program, and Census Bureau population estimates as of July 1, 2003. These data do not present a full picture of the seasonal population increases of coastal or other tourist areas.