Floyd Heads Inland
September 16, 1999 -- Hurricane Floyd is heading
north through the southeastern United States after hitting land early this morning near
Cape Fear, North Carolina. The storm has cut power to hundreds of thousands of people,
uprooted trees and caused widespread flooding after dumping more than 12 inches of rain.
It made a northward turn that spared the state catastrophic damage. 
Listen as NPR's Melissa Block in Myrtle
Beach, South Carolina, describes the scene to Morning Edition host Bob Edwards.
Floyd lost considerable strength before coming ashore -- packing 105 miles an
hour winds -- and was downgraded to a Category Two storm. Hurricane and tropical storm
warnings are in affect for cities up and down the eastern coast of the United States.
Forecasters are predicting it will move up the mid-Atlantic coast from Virginia to Long
Island, New York, and toward Cape Cod, Massachusetts.
In an unprecedented move, some 2.6 million people this week were ordered to
evacuate in the coastal regions of Florida, Georgia and the Carolinas. Concerns about
serious damage prompted President Bill Clinton to declare Florida, Georgia and North and
South Carolina federal disaster areas even before the storm hit. The designation enables
emergency teams to quickly begin recovery efforts.
Florida escaped the worst of the storm, and some coastal residents began to
return home yesterday despite warnings from authorities. However, some 300,000 people
remained without electricity. NASA's shuttles came through the high winds accompanying
Floyd intact, and Orlando's airport and Walt Disney World yesterday resumed limited
operations. But many residents of Florida and Georgia were relieved that Floyd was far less damaging than they
had feared. Listen as NPR’s Debbie Elliott in Jacksonville, Florida, talks with
Morning Edition host Bob Edwards.
Many coastal residents who decided to leave found themselves mired in traffic as
they tried to move inland. Sally Hendricks of Charleston, South Carolina, took 16 hours to
make a 230-mile trip across the state on Tuesday. Others, like Thomas Williams, a store
manager on Oak Island, North Carolina, decided to remain in their homes. Listen
as they speak with All Things Considered Noah Adams.
Damage in the Bahamas
Electricity and telephones yesterday remained down throughout most of the
Bahamas as residents shoveled sand from homes and removed uprooted trees. The storm ripped
through the Bahamas Tuesday with heavy rain and winds, toppling trees, flooding streets, and ripping roofs off houses. Listen as
All Things Considered host Noah Adams talks to Eric Ward of radio station JAMZ in Nassau.
Monitoring the Storm
At one point earlier this week, Floyd was the biggest storm since Hurricane
Andrew, which killed 26 people, left some 160,000 homeless and caused an estimated $25
billion in damage when it struck Florida in 1992. Floyd is being monitored by satellite,
ships and buoys at sea, but crucial information is provided by planes that fly into the
eye of the hurricane. NPR's Joe Palca joined National Hurricane Center scientists on one
such flight out of Miami, Florida.
Listen as he reports for All Things Considered.
The hurricane's behavior has illustrated the two most difficult aspects of storm
prediction: predicting the path of a storm when it turns, and forecasting sudden changes
in intensity. Floyd's course became less sure when it turned north while off the coast of
Florida, and it surprised forecasters when its intensity suddenly dropped
yesterday. Hear more as NPR's Richard Harris reports for All Things Considered.
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BeachBrowser.com
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to survive a hurricane's rage
