HURRICANE SEASON 2008

[Bianca]

                                   Gustav evacuees wait for OK, buses to return home






By PAUL J. WEBER,
Associated Press Writer
Sept. 2, 2008
 
TYLER, Texas - Hurricane Gustav didn't barrel ashore as the devastating terror everyone feared, leaving some of the 2 million people who evacuated second-guessing their decision to flee.
 
Better safe than sorry? Definitely, evacuees said. But better home than stranded elsewhere, too.

Impatience at overcrowded shelters around the Gulf Coast figured to rise Tuesday as evacuees from New Orleans to Southeast Texas waited to learn when buses that whisked them to safety during mandatory evacuations would return to take them home.

"That's the first question everyone is asking," said Jim Rollins, whose First Christian Church in Tyler took in about 140 people from Beaumont. "If you know, please tell me. These people want to go home."

Gustav slammed the Louisiana coastline as a Category 2 hurricane Monday, leaving parts of New Orleans in the dark and threatening some levees. But it fell short of bringing the catastrophic blow many feared, and had been downgraded to a tropical storm late Monday night as it moved across Louisiana and toward Texas.

The same storm that evacuees fled now threatened to dump 4-6 inches of rain on parts of northeast Texas with some locally higher amounts possible, National Weather Service meteorologist Nick Fillo said early Tuesday. The rain could keep many evacuees from going home as quickly as they would like and fray nerves.

Some minor fights broke out at a shelter in Shreveport, La., where evacuees had been packed together in a vacant Sam's Warehouse for three days.

Others became frustrated simply trying to find a place with a cot available. Kenneth and Leslie Smith, of New Orleans, said they spent a day driving city-to-city before finally finding an open shelter for them and their three young children late Monday near Dallas.

"Everyone wasn't mean," Kenneth Smith, 36, said. "But you have some people with nonchalant attitudes who, if they were in my shoes, they would want some help."

Gulf Coast residents have often been reluctant to evacuate — dreading the bumper-to-bumper traffic, the hassle of finding a place to stay and the expense of gasoline, restaurants and hotel rooms — only to return to an unscathed home.

But three years nearly to the day after Hurricane Katrina hit, many residents were glad to leave ahead of Gustav. By late Monday, those still in shelters wanted simply to leave.

A mandatory evacuation order for the Beaumont area, where Hurricane Rita roared ashore in 2005, was lifted at 6 a.m. Tuesday, said Ocie Crosser, spokeswoman for the Jefferson County Emergency Management Office.

But even so, Beaumont police spokeswoman Crystal Holmes said she did not know how quickly buses would begin shuttling people home. Gustav was on a path that could bring some rains and gusty winds to Beaumont, but Holmes said officials wanted to be sure there was no severe damage before bringing residents back.

"Judging by Hurricane Rita, if the transmission lines are down and there's no power, do we want to bring people back in this heat?" Holmes said.

Texas Gov. Rick Perry said state officials will watch the weather as Gustav spins west.

"This may not be over with yet because of the potential of a severe flooding up in northeast Texas," Perry said Monday. "But, again, we'll be ready for it."

Nikketa Gillam, 32, fled Beaumont with her family to Austin in three cars with $300 and had already spent most of it on gas. She sat next to a small tree on a folding chair with a cell phone in hand waiting for any news on when she might be able to get home.

"I could've stayed at home for this," Gillam said. "We evacuated, not by choice."

As one family from Beaumont found out Monday, there's a risk to leaving home. Judy Grigg, a volunteer at Southside Baptist Church in Lufkin, said a family headed home early after learning that someone had broken into their home, stolen everything, killed one dog and blinded the other.

"It wasn't her things," Grigg said of the woman. "It was her dogs."

___




Associated Press writers Andre Coe and Jeff Carlton in Dallas, Christopher Sherman in Lufkin, Jim Vertuno in Austin and John Moreno Gonzales in Shreveport, La. contributed to this report.

[Bianca]

                                     Hanna lashes Bahamas, Ike forms over Atlantic






By VIVIAN TYSON,

Associated Press Writer
12 minutes ago
Sept. 2, 2008
 

PROVIDENCIALES, Turks and Caicos - Hurricane Hanna slumped to tropical storm strength while grinding away at the Bahamas and other Atlantic islands on Tuesday, and forecasters said it still poses a hurricane threat to the U.S. East Coast.
 
The storm snapped trees and kept Providenciales, capital of the Turks and Caicos islands, without power. It hurled rains that caused flooding across Cuba, Haiti and Puerto Rico, where at least one university student died in a rain-swollen river.

Hanna's maximum sustained winds slipped to 70 mph (110 kph), but the U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami said it could regain hurricane strength of 74 mph (119 kph) within a day. Forecasters say it could hit the U.S. coast by Friday or Saturday.

"Right now, the uncertainty is such that it could hit anywhere from Miami to the outer banks of North Carolina," said Jessica Schauer Clark, a meteorologist at the U.S. National Hurricane Center. "So people really need to keep an eye on it."

But Hanna's movement has been agonizingly slow for people in the tourist magnets of the Bahamas and the Turks and Caicos, directly under its winds.

The storm was close to Great Inagua Island Tuesday morning and was drifting toward the west at about 2 mph (4 kph). The hurricane center said it would move over the southeastern Bahamas Tuesday and then into the central part of the island chain by Wednesday.

There were no immediate reports of injuries or major damage in the Turks and Caicos or Bahamas, but officials would assess the situation once the storm has cleared, said Stephen Russell, interim director of the Bahamas National Emergency Management Agency.

Newly formed Tropical Storm Ike was cruising westward across the Atlantic and was projected to near the storm-weary Bahamas by Sunday. It had winds of 50 mph (85 kph) and was expected to grow stronger.

Floods caused by Hanna caused flooding that killed a man from Colombia and left a Brazilian woman missing on Monday. The two were students at the University of Puerto Rico on a trip to the island's east.

People living near the northwestern Haitian city of Gonaives told Radio Caraibes that floods there sent residents fleeing to their roofs. Officials did not immediately confirm the report.

That region still bears the scars of 2004's Tropical Storm Jeanne, which killed some 3,000 people in Gonaives.

More than 8,000 people remain homeless in the wake of Hurricane Gustav, which was downgraded to a tropical storm as it moved over central Louisiana late Monday.

At least 95 people have been killed by storms in Haiti in the last month alone.

Hanna prompted NASA to put off shifting the space shuttle Atlantis from an assembly building at Florida's Kennedy Space Center to the launch pad for at least a day. The move had been scheduled for Tuesday in preparation for an October mission to the Hubble Space Telescope.

Tourists Jason and Carolina Volpi were out of luck as they tried to leave the Turks and Caicos on Monday. The Providenciales airport was shut down and all flights were canceled. They couldn't get seats out until Thursday, too late to attend business meetings back in Italy.

"The situation is very frustrating," Jason Volpi, 36, said as they waited under darkening skies for a taxi back to their hotel.

The European Union said Monday it would give euro2 million (US$2.9 million) to help the recovery from Gustav, which killed at least 94 people. The money will pay for clean water, food, medical care, shelter and basic household items in Haiti, Cuba, Jamaica and the Dominican Republic. In Haiti, 8,000 people are in temporary housing after high winds and floods destroyed homes and farms.

[Bianca]

                                     Hanna lashes Bahamas, threatens US East Coast






By VIVIAN TYSON,
Associated Press Writer
1 hour, 42 minutes ago
Sept. 2, 2008
 
PROVIDENCIALES, Turks and Caicos - Hurricane Hanna slumped to tropical storm strength while grinding away at the Bahamas and other Atlantic islands on Tuesday, and forecasters said it still poses a hurricane threat to the U.S. East Coast.
 
The storm snapped trees and kept Providenciales, capital of the Turks and Caicos islands, without power. It hurled rains that caused flooding across Cuba, Haiti and Puerto Rico, where at least one person died in a rain-swollen river.

Hanna's maximum sustained winds slipped to 70 mph (110 kph) and the U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami said it could weaken further. But it still has the potential to become a hurricane again by Thursday.

The hurricane center said its forecast track would carry Hanna toward "the east coast of Florida, Georgia or South Carolina in two to three days."

But it said the track was uncertain and that the entire Southeastern U.S. coast should closely monitor the storm.

Hanna's movement has been agonizingly slow for people in the tourist magnets of the Bahamas and the Turks and Caicos, directly under its winds.

The storm was near Great Inagua island in the Bahamas around midday Tuesday and was moving to the west-southwest at 6 mph (10 kph). It was expected to reach the central Bahamas by Wednesday.

The storm had not caused major injuries on the island, home to about 1,000 people, but it knocked out power, downed trees and tore shingles from roofs, said Stephen Russell, interim director of the Bahamas National Emergency Management Agency.

"I'm not anticipating any major structural damage," Russell said.

Newly formed Tropical Storm Ike was cruising westward across the central Atlantic and was projected to near the storm-weary Bahamas by Sunday. It had winds of 60 mph (95 kph) and could become a hurricane on Wednesday.

Still further to the east, Tropical Storm Josephine formed and it was heading west at about 15 mph (24 kph), with maximum sustained winds of about 40 mph (65 kph). The hurricane center said it could near hurricane force by Wednesday or Thursday.

A man from Colombia died and a Brazilian woman was missing on Monday after they were swept away in a river swollen by Hanna's rains. The two were students at the University of Puerto Rico on a trip to the island's east.

People living near the northwestern Haitian city of Gonaives told Radio Caraibes that floods there sent residents fleeing to their roofs.

More than 8,000 Haitians remain homeless in the wake of Hurricane Gustav, which was downgraded to a tropical storm as it moved over central Louisiana late Monday.

At least 95 people have been killed by storms in Haiti in the last month alone.

Hanna prompted NASA to put off shifting the space shuttle Atlantis from an assembly building at Florida's Kennedy Space Center to the launch pad for at least a day. The move had been scheduled for Tuesday in preparation for an October mission to the Hubble Space Telescope.

[Bianca]

                                   New Orleans mayor: Please don't come home yet






By ROBERT TANNER and
VICKI SMITH,
Associated Press Writers
25 minutes ago
Sept. 2, 2008

NEW ORLEANS - Anxious evacuees across the country clamored to come home Tuesday after Hurricane Gustav largely spared New Orleans and southern Louisiana, but were cautioned to wait for the restoration of power and other critical services knocked out by the storm.
 
Officials set up checkpoints around the city and hard-hit neighborhoods and promised the National Guard and state police would stop people not authorized to return. The city didn't expect to reopen until Thursday at the earliest.

"I can't get upset, because this is an emergency, you know," said 88-year-old Malvin A. Cavalier Sr., who was turned away as he tried to return to his home in the city's Desire neighborhood. "I just have to be calm and try to do the best I can. If I have to sleep in my car again tonight, I have to do it."

A day after the city's improved levee system kept the streets dry as a disorganized and weakened Gustav passed overhead, there was quiet pride in a historic evacuation of nearly 2 million people. Only eight deaths were attributed to the storm in the U.S. The toll from Katrina three years ago exceeded 1,600.

"The reasons you're not seeing dramatic stories of rescue is because we had a successful evacuation," said Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff. "The only reason we don't have more tales of people in grave danger is because everyone heeded ... the instructions to get out of town."

The focus turned to getting those 2 million people back home. Gov. Bobby Jindal said officials are focused on taking care of the roughly 1,000 critical needs medical patients evacuated from hospitals and nursing homes, while also working with utilities to restore the more than 1.4 million power outages the storm left behind.

In the shelters, people far away from their homes were growing restless. There were fights at an overcrowded shelter in Shreveport, where doctors worried about medications running out and took several people to the hospital.

At a church in Fort Worth, Texas, Denise Preston was rushed to the hospital with a fever. The new mother endured a 12-hour bus ride with her infant son, just a week after giving birth via Caesarean section, to flee her home about 60 miles southwest of New Orleans.

"It's frustrating. I'm ready to go now," Preston said. "They haven't said too much on the news about what's happened in my town. ... Me and the baby sleeping on a cot is hard. He has a crib, but he won't sleep in it."

Gustav is no longer a hurricane, but is still an ugly storm that's expected to dump several inches of rain in northern Louisiana and east Texas. Jindal said Louisiana was only at "halftime" and was worried the damage from rain could exceed Gustav's pounding of the coast.

"This is a serious storm that has caused serious damage in our state," Jindal said before leaving Baton Rouge for a helicopter tour of the mostly rural, low-lying parishes along the state's southeastern and central coast, also home to the state's oil and natural gas industries.

"We're pleased we have not seen major flooding in New Orleans and places that flooded before, but we are facing major challenges in other parts our state."

In Mississippi, where sections of the Gulf Coast were still isolated by flood waters, Gov. Haley Barbour urged residents not to return to their homes until Wednesday.

John Furey, 65, of Pearlington, sat at an island in the flooded kitchen of his 70-year-old brother Pat's home. Both were still working to repair damage from Katrina when Gustav arrived — the only two floods to hit John's red brick home since 1964.

"This is the second time in three years," Furey said. "I just settled with State Farm in March."

[Bianca]

Oil companies and rig owners, which shut down virtually all oil and natural gas production in the Gulf as Gustav approached, headed out to look for damage. Some were already putting equipment and people back in place to resume operations, and a $8 drop in the price of a barrel suggests traders are confident the storm didn't cause much damage.

President Bush, who monitored the storm from Texas, said that while it's too early to assess Hurricane Gustav's damage to U.S. oil infrastructure, it should prompt Congress to OK more domestic oil production. He said when Congress comes back from recess, lawmakers "need to understand" that the nation needs more, not less domestic energy production.

For those who did stay behind, cleanup began. Dickey Arnold, 57, rode out the storm with his wife and granddaughter in Franklin, 100 miles to the east of New Orleans. The owner of a residential glass business said he didn't see much work ahead, finding few homes with broken windows or structural damage after driving through town.

"That's mostly what I see when I went riding around town: tree damage, so thank God for that," he said.

Authorities tried to keep those who did flee Franklin and the rest of St. Mary Parish, both near the epicenter of the storm, from coming back too soon. Officials don't think there is power anywhere in the parish, and the focus is first on restoring electric to the hospital and courthouse. Sheriff's deputies were mostly picking up tree limbs from roads and watching homes where trees fell onto roofs.

"I've yet to see one that's uninhabitable," said sheriff's Maj. Mark Hebert. "It could have been worse. We have a lot of work to do."

Jindal said state officials are deferring to local communities on when they will reopen. Electric crews started work on restoring power to the nearly 80,000 homes and businesses in New Orleans — and more than 1 million in the region — that remained without power after the storm damaged transmission lines that snapped like rubber bands in the wind.

Jindal said there were 11,000 crewmen working on bringing back power to Louisiana, where the storm mostly damaged transmission lines — meaning large groups of customers could see he lights and air conditioning come back all at once. Still, Jindal warned those without power not to expect a fix overnight.

[Bianca]

The New Orleans sewer system was damaged, and hospitals statewide were working with skeleton crews on backup power. Drinking water continued to flow in the city and the pumps that keep it dry never shut down — two critical service failings that contributed to Katrina's toll. The FAA said the city's airport was expected to reopen at 7 p.m.

Nagin apologized to the Republicans, which put the pageantry of their convention on hold to wait for Gustav to move through the Gulf Coast.

"You know, I think Gustav rained on their parade, on their little party," said Nagin, a Democrat, who cut his own trip short to his party's convention to prepare for the storm. "And hopefully they can rekindle. We'd love to host them in New Orleans next week, and they can come down and we can show them how to really do it right."

Like Jindal and Chertoff, Nagin took pride in a massive evacuation effort that succeeded in urging people to leave or catch buses and trains out: Almost 2 million people left coastal Louisiana, and only about 10,000 people rode out the storm in New Orleans.

"I would not do a thing differently," Nagin said. "I'd probably call Gustav, instead of the mother of all storms, maybe the mother-in-law or the ugly sister of all storms."

With three months left in the Atlantic hurricane season, he may yet get his chance. Three storms were lining up off the U.S. coast, with Tropical Storm Hanna leading the way. Hanna has plenty of time to strengthen into a hurricane before possibly striking Florida and Georgia later in the week.

___



Associated Press writers Becky Bohrer, Cain Burdeau, Allen G. Breed contributed to this report from New Orleans. Janet McConnaughey and Alan Sayre contributed from Hammond. Doug Simpson in Baton Rouge, Michael Kunzelman in Lafayette, La., Vicki Smith in Montegut, La., Jay Reeves in Orange Beach, Ala. and Holbrook Mohr in Gulfport, Miss., also contributed.

[Bianca]

         








                                                  Gustav revives question: Is New Orleans worth it?






By LARA JAKES JORDAN,
Associated Press Writer
Tue Sep 2, 2008
 
WASHINGTON - Those who love New Orleans say Hurricane Gustav is proof that the billions of dollars spent to protect the city and bring it back to life after the devastating 2005 storm season was worth it.
 
But what if Gustav had been stronger, a category 4 instead of a 2, and hit the city directly instead of 70 miles to the west? Would it be worth the cost to rebuild New Orleans again if the storm caused widespread destruction as Katrina did?

"That's a question that was there before and after (Hurricane) Katrina, and I think is going to come to the forefront again," said Don Powell, who oversaw the Bush administration's effort to rebuild the Gulf Coast in 2005.

"There's a lot of reasons to continue," Powell said Monday, his voice trailing off. "That's a debate we will continue to have."

Despite fizzling out shortly after it made landfall Monday, Gustav spurred the government into action, probably costing millions of dollars, and put a nation angered by the bungled response to Katrina three years ago back on alert.

Since Katrina ripped through New Orleans three years ago, the federal government has devoted at least $133 billion in emergency funds and tax credits for Gulf Coast disaster relief. Much of it went to rebuilding and better protecting New Orleans from future storms. How much more will be needed after Gustav — or Hurricane Hanna, as that storm creeps up Florida's eastern coast — is unclear.

Former GOP House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., infuriated Louisiana lawmakers when he suggested in 2005 that a lot of New Orleans "could be bulldozed" after Katrina and questioned the wisdom of rebuilding it. More dispassionate observers note that no matter how much is spent, New Orleans will continue to swallow federal dollars with each gulp of the Gulf or Lake Pontchartrain.

"New Orleans didn't rise up in the ground from where they were before," Harvey E. Johnson, deputy director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, said shortly before Gustav's landfall. "They're still below sea level. So you're still going to get water inside of New Orleans. And they know that."

A study last month by the Brookings Institution, a Washington think tank, concluded that 72 percent of the city's households that fled Katrina returned to New Orleans, as did 90 percent of its sales tax revenues. However, as many as 65,000 blighted properties or empty lots still mar the city, and house rents are up 46 percent.

To die-hard residents and other devotees of the Big Easy, the money poured into the Gulf Coast to continue oil production, preserve local culture and, most importantly, strengthen levees showed that New Orleans could withstand another battering by Mother Nature.

"This will actually be good news, because this makes clear that the historic city can be protected," said Walter Isaacson, former vice chairman of the Louisiana Recovery Authority during the administration of ex-Gov. Kathleen Blanco. "New Orleans rebuilt itself because people love the place, and we're all heartened that the new levee system seems strong, and the city seems safe.

"The worst has passed."

Some observers aren't so sure.

"It's a soup bowl and it's not safe," said Beverly Cigler, a public policy professor at Penn State University, referring to the city's cup-shaped geography.

Local political eagerness to develop property in New Orleans instead of protecting wetlands, which serve as a natural storm buffer, has hampered safety, said Cigler, co-chair of a Katrina task force set up by the American Society for Public Administration. Levees, meanwhile, are still three years away from being fully strengthened. And since there are differing levels of elevation throughout the city, "some places are safer than others."

"My own personal opinion is that you shouldn't rebuild in areas unless you can make them safe," she said. "And nobody's had the willingness to confront these kinds of issues."

[Bianca]

Local political eagerness to develop property in New Orleans instead of protecting wetlands, which serve as a natural storm buffer, has hampered safety, said Cigler, co-chair of a Katrina task force set up by the American Society for Public Administration. Levees, meanwhile, are still three years away from being fully strengthened. And since there are differing levels of elevation throughout the city, "some places are safer than others."

"My own personal opinion is that you shouldn't rebuild in areas unless you can make them safe," she said. "And nobody's had the willingness to confront these kinds of issues."

Yet abandoning New Orleans hardly seems an option either.

The Gulf Coast is home to nearly half the nation's refining capacity, 25 percent of offshore domestic oil production and 15 percent of natural gas output. Tens of thousands of construction workers, hoteliers, nurses and other service employees who flocked to New Orleans in Katrina's aftermath have helped keep local unemployment low. Not to mention that giving up would, essentially, mean spending all those billions of dollars for naught.

"It's clear that a lot of the money was spent well — even if it's far too early to declare victory," said Don Kettl, University of Pennsylvania public policy professor and co-editor of "On Risk and Disaster: Lessons From Hurricane Katrina."

"If you walk away, you are condemning the city to tremendous suffering," Kettl said. "As serious as the suffering was the last time, it didn't completely destroy the city. The real challenge is deciding what kind of city you want."

___



EDITOR'S NOTE — Lara Jakes Jordan covered the federal response to hurricanes Katrina, Rita and Wilma in 2005 and 2006.

[Bianca]

                                 Category 4 Hurricane Ike fiercer as Hanna strengthens






By Joseph Guyler Delva
Thu Sep 4, 5:06 AM ET

PORT-AU-PRINCE (Reuters) - Hurricane Ike strengthened rapidly into an fiercely dangerous Category 4 hurricane in the open Atlantic on Wednesday and Tropical Storm Hanna intensified to a lesser degree as it swirled over the Bahamas toward the southeast U.S. Coast.
 
Ike posed no immediate threat to land but strengthened explosively, growing in the space of a few hours from a tropical storm to an intense Category 4 hurricane on the five-step Saffir-Simpson intensity scale.

Ike had top sustained winds near 145 mph (230 kph) as it swept across the open waters of the west-central Atlantic 550 miles (885 km) northeast of the Leeward Islands, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said. It was moving west-northwest near 17 mph (28 kph).

It was forecast to head for the southern Bahamas early next week but it was too early to tell whether it would threaten land, the forecasters said.

It was also too soon to say whether Ike would threaten U.S. oil and natural gas producers in the Gulf of Mexico.

The hurricane center's Web site, with updates and graphics, is at http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/index.shtml.

Hanna's torrential rains had already submerged parts of Haiti, stranding residents on rooftops and prompting President Rene Preval to warn of an "extraordinary catastrophe" to rival a storm that killed more than 3,000 people in the flood-prone Caribbean country four years ago.

Hanna was forecast to move over the central and northern Bahamas on Thursday, strengthening back into a hurricane with winds of at least 74 mph (119 kph) before hitting the U.S. coast near the North Carolina-Virginia border on Saturday.

The government of the Bahamas had ended a hurricane warning for the northwestern part of the islands, meaning a tropical storm warning was now in effect for all of the Bahamas and for the Turks and Caicos Islands, the hurricane center said.

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'TENACIOUS CYCLONE'



Hanna has been a "tenacious tropical cyclone" that is forecast to regain hurricane force in a day or two but possibly sooner, it said. "A hurricane watch may be required for a portion of the southeastern United States coast early Thursday," the center said.

Tropical Storm Josephine also marched across the Atlantic on a westward course behind Ike but it had begun to weaken.

The burst of storm activity follows Hurricane Gustav, which slammed into Louisiana near New Orleans on Monday after a course that also took it through Haiti, where it killed more than 75 people.

The U.S. government has forecast 14 to 18 tropical storms will form during the six-month season that began on June 1, more than the historical average of 10. Josephine was already the 10th of the year, forming before the statistical peak of the season on September 10.

The record-busting 2005 season, which included deadly Hurricane Katrina, had 28 storms.

In Haiti, officials were still counting the scores of people killed by Gustav when Hanna struck the impoverished nation on Monday night.

Authorities said Hanna caused flooding and mudslides that killed at least 61 people across Haiti, including 22 in the low-lying port of Gonaives. The death toll was expected to rise as floodwaters receded and rescuers reached remote areas.

"We are in a really catastrophic situation," said Preval, who planned to hold emergency talks with representatives of international donor countries to appeal for aid.

"It is believed that compared to Jeanne, Hanna could cause even more damage," he said, referring to a storm that sent floodwaters and mud cascading into Gonaives and other parts of Haiti's north and northwest in September 2004, killing more than 3,000 people.

Gonaives residents were still stranded on their rooftops two days after the floodwaters rose and the government did not know the fate of those who had been in hospitals and prisons.

"There are a lot of people on rooftops and there are prisoners that we cannot guard," Preval said.

Hanna had hovered off Haiti's coast since Monday, drowning crops in a desperately poor nation already struggling with food shortages. It also triggered widespread flooding in the neighboring Dominican Republic.

The Miami-based hurricane center said it was too early to say where Ike might go, after it churns through the Caribbean, but the storm has drawn the attention of energy companies running the 4,000 offshore platforms in the Gulf of Mexico that provide the United States with a quarter of its crude oil and 15 percent of its natural gas.

By late Wednesday, Josephine was swirling over the far eastern Atlantic about 465 miles west of the Cape Verde Islands. It was moving west but had begun to weaken, with top sustained winds dropping to 60 mph (95 kph).




(Additional reporting by Tom Brown in Miami; writing by Jane Sutton; editing by Todd Eastham and Philip Barbara)

[cleasterwood]

Each new report brings more bad news for those of us in South Florida.  As you all know I live in Broward county (right next to Miami-Dade) & the last 3 reports have Hurricane Ike coming right at us.  The wind speed has dropped to 125 MPH, but it is still a category 3.  We can only hope that the high weakens to allow Ike to head out into sea instead of pummeling us as a Cat 2 or 3.  I've been saying all year that we are overdue for a major storm & sadly, it looks like I'm right.  Only time will tell if we are spared Ike's furry.  We are as prepared as we're going to get.  We have gas for our cars & generator, water, & some canned food. 
Keep us in your prayers.
Blessings,
Lynn

[Eclipse of the Sun]

Well, Ike is still very far away, so hopefully it will lose steam by the time it gets to Florida. On the bright side, at least Florida looks like it is going to miss the brunt of Hanna!

And Gustav was supposed to be the "mother of all storms" before it quieted down a bit and it hit the Gulf Coast. No question, though, I don't know how you in the gulf states deal with all these hurricanes, they look really terrible. 

[cleasterwood]

Well, Ike is still very far away, so hopefully it will lose steam by the time it gets to Florida. On the bright side, at least Florida looks like it is going to miss the brunt of Hanna!

And Gustav was supposed to be the "mother of all storms" before it quieted down a bit and it hit the Gulf Coast. No question, though, I don't know how you in the gulf states deal with all these hurricanes, they look really terrible. 

We are getting rain from Hanna as we speak, but yes, the brunt of it is missing us.  I'm not concerned about Hanna anymore.  Although Ike may still be about 1100 miles from us, it looks healthy & is moving at 15-17 MPH with sustained winds of 125 MPH!  We are also under a state of emergency.  Hurricane winds extend 45 miles from the center so regardless of where it hits in Florida, we will feel the effects of Ike.  Unfortunately, the "official" forecast cone has it hitting somewhere in Florida, no later than Tues/Wed.  The models are indicating that Ike could become a category 4 before it makes landfall & some people are comparing it to Hurricane Andrew. I happen to agree.  Andrew wiped out Homestead almost completely.  I was living in Fort Lauderdale (a little north of my current location) when it hit in 1992 & it was very nasty.   We have been spared for 16 years and are over-due for an impact from a major storm.  It is only a matter of time.  However, I am also hopeful Ike will be less intense than forecast.

Living in Hurricane Alley isn't too bad until there is a major storm.  We can see them coming & be prepared for these massive storms so it isn't too bad.  The way I look at is thusly, "It's the price we pay for living in paradise."  I live far away enough from the beach that my home has become a hub for my friends who must evacuate.  We have gas, generators, water, & all we need to buy is extra non-perisible foods.

Blessings & may all in the path of these storms stay safe.
Lynn

[Bianca]

                         Tropical Storm Hanna set to soak US East Coast






By KEVIN MAURER,
Associated Press Writer
15 minutes ago
 Sept. 5, 2008

HOLDEN BEACH, N.C. - Beach vacationers in the Carolinas packed up and headed inland Friday as Tropical Storm Hanna cruised steadily toward the coast, while others decided to ride out the fast-moving storm that had only a slight chance to become a small hurricane before crashing ashore overnight.
 
The storm will likely wash out the weekend from the Carolinas to Maine. Tropical storm watches or warnings ran from Georgia to Rhode Island, and included all of Chesapeake Bay, the Washington D.C. area and Long Island.

As the first rain started to fall on the popular barrier island beaches south of Wilmington, Sam Owens packed up the camper he brought from State College, Pa., to the dunes that line the ocean side of Holden Beach. He had rented a spot for four months, but the campground's owners said the high winds Hanna will bring with her meant it was time to go.

"We have to be out by noon and that is what we are going to do," said Owens, 56-year-old retired Marine. "I hope I can come back because either way I have to pay."

The latest forecast called on Hanna to make landfall on the northern coast of South Carolina around 2 a.m. Saturday before marching quickly up the Atlantic seaboard and pushing into New England by early Sunday morning. Hanna was expected to dump several inches of rain on in North and South Carolina, as well as central Virginia, Maryland and southeastern Pennsylvania.

Some spots could see up to 10 inches of rain, and forecasters warned of the potential for flash flooding in the northern mid-Atlantic states and southern New England.

"This is not just not going to be a coastal issue and we need to be aware of that," North Carolina Gov. Mike Easley said Friday. "This is a very, very large storm, a huge low pressure system, so the winds and the rain are going to be widespread north and south as well as east and west."

In Charleston, Mayor Joseph P. Riley Jr. said there was no reason to flee, but urged residents to stay inside when Hanna blows through with wind gusts that could reach 65 mph.

"Stay home, protect yourself, look out for your neighbors and we will get through this just fine," he said.

Several counties in both North and South Carolina opened shelters, and hotels further inland offered discounts to those fleeing Hanna's path. But on the thin barrier islands that make up North Carolina's Outer Banks, vacation home owner Joe DiStefano checked out the forecast early Friday and said Hanna appears to be moving too quickly to cause much damage.

"It's the storms that linger — that keep blowing and blowing and causing a lot of erosion — that do the most damage," said DiStefano, of Deale, Md., taking a break from reading a magazine on the beach in Nags Head. "Unless it stays for a long time, it's not too worrying."

Andy and Janine Curlee brought kites to Myrtle Beach, S.C., on Friday morning, after arriving the night before for a family weekend. They were leaving Sunday, and hoped Hanna would move fast enough to clear things out for a nice beach day Saturday afternoon.

No matter the weather, Janine Curlee already had plans for Saturday morning. "Storms make it great for shelling," she said.

As of 11 a.m. EDT Friday, Hanna had maximum sustained winds near 65 mph and was centered about 375 miles south of Wilmington. The storm was moving toward the northwest near 20 mph. A hurricane watch remained in effect for Edisto Beach, S.C., to the Outer Banks of North Carolina near the Virginia border.

The occasional rain showers drifted over Myrtle Beach, which was guarded Friday by red "No Swimming" flags. Randy Kent, who arrived from Toronto, Canada, on Wednesday, was among the dozens of people walking up and down the beach, watching the waves churned up by the approaching storm.

"It looks kind of ominous today, doesn't it?" said Kent, who had no plans to flee or cut his vacation short. "I'm on the 20th floor and I don't think the building's coming down."

In the District of Columbia, officials prepared for the possibility of flooding in low-lying neighborhoods by removing debris from catch basins and stockpiling sandbags, said Jo'Ellen Countee, a D.C. Emergency Management Agency spokesman. Portable pumps and generators also were to be placed in problem areas.

Still, the bigger worry was the ferocious-looking Hurricane Ike, which weakened to a Category 3 storm early Friday as it headed toward the Bahamas and Florida. And with power outages and problems from Hurricane Gustav lingering in Louisiana, Arkansas and Mississippi, the Federal Emergency Management Agency and relief groups found themselves juggling three storms.

"You've got to make a snap judgment just before the play of where you're going to stay," said FEMA's head of disaster operations, Glenn Cannon. "We don't want to get sucked in by having all of our resources at the wrong place, but we've got to be flexible enough to move."

The normally bustling waterfront in Morehead City was nearly deserted early Friday. Charter captain Bobby Ballou said most of his colleagues decided to haul out before Hanna arrived, but the 60-year veteran of the charter business sat on a bench at his dock and spliced thick lines to tie up his boat.

"I'm not too worried about this one," said 74-year-old Ballou. "That Ike, I don't like him."

___

Associated Press writers Estes Thompson in Morehead City, Mike Baker in Nags Head, Gary D. Robertson in Raleigh, Bruce Smith in Charleston, S.C., and Jeffery Collins in Myrtle Beach, S.C., contributed to this report.

[Bianca]

                                 Hanna rakes Carolinas with rain, wind, some floods






By WHITNEY WOODWARD,
Associated Press Writer
36 minutes ago
 
Sept. 6, 2008

RALEIGH, N.C. - Tropical Storm Hanna blew hard and dumped rain in eastern North Carolina and Virginia Saturday, but caused little damage beyond isolated flooding and power outages as it quickly headed north toward New England.
 
Hanna sailed easily over the beaches of Carolinas' coast, and emergency officials were already looking past it to powerful Hurricane Ike, several hundred miles out in the Atlantic. With Category 3 winds of near 115 mph, Ike could approach Cuba and southern Florida by Monday, as Hanna spins away from Canada over the North Atlantic.

"Hanna is heading north in a hurry, leaving behind sunshine for the weekend," said Myrtle Beach city spokesman Mark Kruea.

He said city services would be open and that "despite a week of preliminary hype" the storm didn't have much of an impact on the city aside from a few downed trees and some power outages that were repaired in less than a half-hour. It was the same story in eastern North Carolina, where Hanna had top winds of around 50 mph after coming ashore around 3:20 a.m.

Julia Jarema, a spokeswoman at the N.C. Emergency Operations Center, said there are reports of some localized flooding, temporary road closures and scattered power outages, but that officials haven't heard about too many problems.

"As the day goes on, I'm sure we're going to hear more reports of flooding as people get out and get on the roads," she said.

At least 1,500 spent the night in shelters and more than 60,000 customers — mostly around Wilmington, N.C. — were without power early Saturday in the Carolinas. In Virginia, 20,000 customers had no power. State police closed all northbound lanes of Interstate 95 just north of Richmond after power lines fell around 8:30 a.m.

And the Coast Guard closed all navigable waters in the Port of Hampton Roads, the lower Maryland Eastern Shore and the Port of Richmond, Va., on the James River.

Heavy rain fell in the Carolinas, including 5 inches in Fayetteville and the Sandhills region. The same was forecast for central Virginia, Maryland and southeastern Pennsylvania, where some spots could get up to 10 inches. Forecasters warned of the potential for flash flooding in the northern mid-Atlantic states and southern New England.

"Fortunately it happened during the night, on the weekend. That would be a mess if it happened during the week as people are tying to get to work," said National Weather Service meteorologist Jonathan Blaes.

No rain fell to the west in Charlotte, where Tropical Storm Fay flooded streets and forced evacuations two weeks ago. To the east, on North Carolina's Outer Banks, the stinging sand and sea spray didn't keep 78-year-old William Cusick from getting up early to walk his dog on the beach.

"I don't see anything too exciting about this — it's not too serious," Cusick said.

The wind started to kick in about 2:30 a.m. in Morehead City, said Don Ogle of Newport, the night manager of a motel in the city along North Carolina's central coast. He said half of the motel's day crew stayed overnight.

"I don't know why. I'd go home if I could," he said.

Hanna started drenching the Carolina coast Friday, with some street flooding by late afternoon. People on the beach had to shout to be heard. By the time it reached the coast, the storm's top sustained winds had dropped to about 60 mph from near 70 mph while the storm was over water.

"All I've heard is wind, wind and more wind," said 19-year-old Dylan Oslzewski, who was working an overnight shift at a convenience store in Shallotte, N.C., about 15 miles north of the state line with South Carolina. Oslzewski said he had only had four customers compared to 30 or 40 on a typical weekend night.