Page 3 - Hurricanes

Thousands in North Carolina without water days after Helene's destruction

The powerful storm inundated the western part of the state with catastrophic flooding, destroying pipes, damaging water plants and cutting off power

Days after Hurricane Helene, powerless mess remains in US Southeast

Sherry Brown has gotten nearly the entire miserable Hurricane Helene experience at her home. She's out of power and water. There is a tree on her roof and her SUV. She is converting power from the alternator in her car to keep just enough juice for her refrigerator so she can keep some food. Brown is far from alone. Helene was a tree and power pole wrecking ball as it blew inland across Georgia, South Carolina and into North Carolina on Friday. Five days later, more than 1.4 million homes and businesses in the three states don't have power, according to poweroutage.us. It's muggy, pitch black at night and sometimes dangerous with chainsaws buzzing, tensioned power lines ready to snap and carbon monoxide silently suffocating people who don't use generators properly. While there are fewer water outages than electric issues, plenty of towns and cities have lost their water systems too, at least temporarily. Brown said she is surviving in Augusta, Georgia, by taking "bird baths" with ..

US key state faces poll uncertainty after storm ravages multiple counties

North Carolina election officials say they will do everything in their power to ensure that voters in the crucial presidential swing state will be able to cast their ballots despite the devastation of Hurricane Helene and the destruction of basic infrastructure only about a month before the November election. Karen Brinson Bell, the executive director of the state's election board, said on Tuesday that 12 county election offices in the hard-hit western part of the state remain closed after the storm unleashed "unprecedented" damage. Absentee ballots, some of which already have been mailed to voters who requested them, also face obstacles, from US Postal Service delays to road and residential damage that could render them undeliverable. The viability of early and Election Day voting sites remains unknown, she said. She described the storm as causing a "daunting" level of uncertainty, with early in-person voting scheduled to start in just over two weeks on October 17. Still, she said .

North Carolina launches massive search, rescue operation in wake of Helene

Some 1,200 federal personnel were on the ground in addition to state and local responders, and the Army Corps of Engineers was planning major debris removal

Over 1.6 million US customers still without power after Hurricane Helene

US energy company Duke Energy had the most power outages in the Carolinas with about 415,601 customers still out in South Carolina and 287,369 out in North Carolina, according to PowerOutage.us.

Hurricane Helene: Toll hits 100, aid rushed to North Carolina, Florida

President Joe Biden described the impact of the storm as stunning and said he would visit the area this week

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64 dead, millions without power after Helene's march across Southeast US

Helene blew ashore in Florida's Big Bend region as a Category 4 hurricane late Thursday with winds of 140 mph

Hurricane Helene claims 44 lives in US, wreaking havoc across Southeast

Hurricane Helene left an enormous path of destruction across Florida and the entire southeastern US on Friday, killing at least 35 people in four states, snapping trees like twigs, tearing apart homes and sending rescue crews on desperate missions to save people from floodwaters. Georgia Governor Brian Kemp said dozens of people were still trapped in buildings damaged by the Category 4 hurricane. The storm had maximum sustained winds of 140 mph (225 kph) when it made landfall late Thursday in a sparsely populated region in Florida's rural Big Bend area, home to fishing villages and vacation hideaways where Florida's Panhandle and peninsula meet. The damage extended hundreds of miles to the north, with flooding as far away as northeast Tennessee, where a dangerous rescue situation was unfolding after 54 people were moved to the roof of the Unicoi County Hospital while rapid waters flooded the facility, according to Ballad Health. In North Carolina, a lake used in the movie Dirty ...

Hurricane Helene hits Florida, raising fears of widespread damage, deaths

Officials pleaded with residents in the path of the storm to heed mandatory evacuation orders or face life-threatening conditions

John rapidly strengthens into Category 3 hurricane off Mexico's coast

Hurricane John ripped toward Mexico's southern coast on Monday after rapidly intensifying over the eastern Pacific Ocean, surprising authorities who called for residents of some coastal areas to head for cover. The US National Hurricane Centre said John had rapidly strengthened into a Category 3 hurricane with maximum sustained winds of 120 mph (190 kph). The storm was extremely close to the coast about 15 miles (20 kilometers) south of Punta Maldonado and it was moving north at 8 mph (13 kph). John was set to touch land late Monday night, according to forecasters and Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador. "Seek higher ground, protect yourselves and do not forget that life is the most important thing; material things can be replaced. We are here," wrote Lopez Obrador on a post on the social media platform X. Forecasters projected John would hit the beachside town of Punta Maldonado head on, and also likely batter nearby tourist hubs Acapulco and Puerto Escondido before ...

Hurricane Francine forces Louisiana evacuations, oil & gas shutdowns

Francine was developing more slowly than earlier forecast but could still wallop the Louisiana coast on Wednesday

Hurricane Ernesto pounds Bermuda as wealthy British territory closes down

Hurricane Ernesto began to pound Bermuda late Friday with heavy winds and rain after officials in the tiny British territory in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean opened shelters and closed government offices. The Category 2 storm located 95 miles (150 kilometres) south-southwest of Bermuda was packing maximum sustained winds of 100 mph (155 kph). It was moving northeast at 13 mph (20 kph). Ernesto's large eye will likely be very near or over Bermuda early Saturday morning, with significant coastal flooding expected, according to the National Hurricane Centre. Preparations to protect life and property should be rushed to completion, the centre said. The storm was forecast to dump between 6 to 9 inches of rain. Forecasters noted that Ernesto was a large hurricane, with hurricane-force winds extending up to 75 miles (120 kilometres) from the centre and tropical-storm-force winds extending up to 275 miles (445 kilometres). In preparation for the storm, officials in the wealthy British

Hurricane Ernesto becomes Category 2 storm as it races toward Bermuda

At 11 p.m. ET on Thursday (0300 GMT Friday) it was 410 miles (660 km) south-southwest of Bermuda as it headed north, packing winds of 100 mph (155 kph)

Debby finally moves out of US, risk from flooded rivers still remains

Debby finally moved out of the US on Saturday after the storm spent the better part of week unleashing tornadoes and flooding, damaging homes and taking lives as it moved up the East Coast after first arriving in Florida as a hurricane. Debby's last day over the US before blowing into Canada inundated south-central New York and north-central Pennsylvania with rain, prompting evacuations and rescues by helicopter. The post-tropical cyclone continued dropping rain on New England and southern Quebec, Canada, on Friday night with conditions expected to improve Saturday morning as the system continued moving northeast. Some of the worst flash flooding in New York on Friday happened in villages and hamlets in a largely rural area south of the Finger Lakes. In Steuben County, which borders Pennsylvania, officials ordered the evacuation of the towns of Jasper, Woodhull and part of Addison, and said people were trapped as floodwaters made multiple roads impassable. By mid-evening, some of .

Deadly tornado, flooding, and heavy rains plague residents in Debby's path

Tornadoes spawned by Debby leveled homes, damaged a school and killed one person early Thursday, as the tropical system dropped heavy rain and flooded communities across North and South Carolina. It only took 15 seconds for a tornado to devastate Genesis Cooper's home in Lucama, North Carolina, a small town about 40 miles (64 kilometres) east of Raleigh. He almost slept through it if not for an alert on his wife's phone. He, his wife and their 20-year-old son huddled in a bathroom with blankets. They felt vibrations and heard glass shattering before hearing a sudden boom. I can't even describe it. It's like, suction, that's what it felt like, Cooper said. Like something is squeezing, like your ears are popping. The tornado was one of at least three reported overnight in North Carolina, and perhaps the most devastating. One person was found dead in a home damaged by the Lucama tornado, Wilson County spokesman Stephen Mann said in an email. No further details on the person were ...

South Carolina prepares for deluge as Tropical Storm Debby makes landfall

At least six people have died in Florida and Georgia in the wake of the storm

Hurricane Debby to bring heavy rains, severe flooding to Florida, Georgia

Debby is the fourth named storm of the 2024 Atlantic hurricane season

Storm Debby barrels toward Florida, with potential heavy rains in north

Tropical Storm Debby strengthened rapidly Sunday and was expected to become a hurricane as it moved through the Gulf of Mexico toward Florida, bringing with it the threat of devastating floods to the southeast Atlantic coast later in the week. The storm was likely to become a Category 1 hurricane before making landfall Monday in the Big Bend region of Florida, the National Hurricane Center in Miami said. From there, the storm is expected to move eastward over northern Florida and then stall over the coastal regions of Georgia and South Carolina, drenching the region with the potential of record-setting rains totalling up to 30 inches (76 cm) beginning Tuesday. There's some really amazing rainfall totals being forecast and amazing in a bad way, Michael Brennan, director of the National Hurricane Center in Miami, said at a briefing Sunday. That would be record-breaking rainfall associated with a tropical cyclone for both the states of Georgia and South Carolina if we got up to the 30

Torrential rains hit Canada's largest city, closing major highway, roads

A major highway, several other thoroughfares and a key transit hub were flooded in Toronto as torrential rains washed over Canada's largest city Tuesday, causing power outages in multiple areas. Toronto police said part of the Don Valley Parkway, which runs from the north part of the city into the downtown area, was closed due to flooding. They also said part of Lakeshore Boulevard, which runs along Lake Ontario, was flooded and closed. Toronto Fire Services said it rescued 14 people from flooding on the highway. We're actively rescuing people that are trapped in their cars or on top of their cars, Deputy Fire Chief Jim Jessop told reporters in the afternoon. We are triaging based on life safety. Tima Nizomov was among those who got stranded on the Don Valley Parkway. The 26-year-old said he had to wait in his BMW, with water around him, until firefighters arrived. A lot of water came but...my car is stuck and that's it, he said, recalling his decision to stay in his vehicle as wa