2 million evacuate as Irene bears down on US
A lot of New York’s subways and other infrastructure are underground and subject to flooding in the event of an unusually strong storm surge or heavy rains.
As the storm’s outermost bands of wind and rain began to lash North Carolina, authorities in points farther north begged people to get out of harm’s way. Officials feared it could wreak devastation in a region not used to tropical weather.
“Don’t wait. Don’t delay,” said President Barack Obama, who cut short his summer holiday by a day and return to Washington.
Hurricane warnings were issued from North Carolina to New York, and watches were posted farther north, on the islands of Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard off Massachusetts. Evacuation orders covered one million people in New Jersey, 315,000 in Maryland, 300,000 in North Carolina and 100,000 in Delaware.
“This is probably the largest number of people that have been threatened by a single hurricane in the United States,” said Jay Baker, a geography professor at Florida State University.
New York City ordered more than 300,000 people who live in flood-prone areas to leave.
The United States’ biggest city, of more than eight million people, took the unprecedented step as 55 million Americans on the eastern seaboard braced for the menacing hurricane.
Irene began lashing the east coast of the US with rain ahead of a weekend of violent weather that is almost certain to heap punishment on a vast stretch of shoreline from the Carolinas to Massachusetts.
Irene has the potential to cause billions of dollars in damage all along a densely populated arc including Washington, Baltimore, Philadelphia, New York, Boston and beyond. At least 65 million people are in its projected track.
As the storm trudged northwest from the Bahamas, rain from its outer bands began falling along the North and South Carolina coast. Swells and 6-9ft waves were reported along the Outer Banks. Thousands had already lost power as the fringes of the storm began raking the shore.
“We’re going to have damages. We just don’t know how bad,” said Craig Fugate, director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency. “This is one of the largest populations that will be impacted by one storm at one time.”
Irene could also push crude oil prices higher if it disrupts refineries in Delaware, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Virginia.
The hurricane would be the strongest to strike the east coast in seven years.
