Tropical storm-force winds from Florence spread over North Carolina coast

Duke Energy serves 4 million people in the Carolinas.

Conditions will deteriorate through Thursday (local time): Starting along the coast, winds will accelerate, the rain will intensify, and the ocean will surge ashore. It’s expected to make landfall later today.

Adding to concerns, forecasters warned the larger and slow-moving storm could linger for days around the coast, leaving many without power and supplies. This storm surge can be deadly and then the flooding that will come thereafter with rain being measured in feet instead of inches. Hurricane-force winds extended 80 miles (130 kilometers) from its center, and tropical-storm-force winds up to 195 miles (315 kilometers). “So will the power lines, as the trees fall down”.

Hurricane Florence has weakened slightly to a Category 2 storm, but don’t be fooled, it’s still incredibly risky. The effects of the storm will begin being felt Thursday night as rain and high winds begin to impact North and SC. Widespread rainfall amounts could reach 152mm to 300mm, spurring flooding. “Don’t plan to leave once the winds and rains start”.

He warned of “feet of rain not inches” in the Carolinas and Virginia. Its trajectory showed its center most likely to strike the southern coast of North Carolina by late Thursday or early Friday, the National Hurricane Center said.

This satellite image of Florence hurtling towards the east coast on Wednesday gives a sense of its massive scale.

The downgraded status of the storm, which indicates that Hurricane Florence is moving at maximum sustained wind speeds of 110 miles per hour, means little in terms of its impact and deadly potential, according to Elliot Abrams, chief forecaster at Accuweather.

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After that, Florence is forecast to move northwest and north and move across western SC on Sunday, Sept. 15, and across western North Carolina and eastern Tennessee on Monday, Sept. 16, the NHC said.

More than 10 million people are under watches and warnings, the Associated Press reported. As serene as the images are, it’s hard to imagine what conditions are like in the storm and on the water under it. A further 10 million people are now under some form of storm watch. Currently, the hurricane-force winds extend outward 80 miles from the center and tropical storm-force winds extend almost 200 miles from the eye.

The surge will result in “large areas of deep inundation. enhanced by battering waves”, the Weather Service said.

Normally when we talk about the potential for hurricane damage, we talk about the impact of storm surges and high winds – both of which are, to be sure, incredibly unsafe in their own right.

Georgia Governor Nathan Deal, concerned the storm would bring its devastation south, issued an emergency declaration for all 159 counties in his state.