Hurricane Sandy

As the day begins here attention goes to the monster storm in the United States. It looks as if it is going to be huge.

No doubt there will be more to come as the day (night) progresses.

Monster Hurricane Sandy batters US coast

Stuff,

20 October, 2012

Hurricane Sandy has begun battering the US East Coast with fierce winds and driving rain, as the monster storm shuts down transportation, shut businesses and sends thousands scrambling for higher ground hours before the worst is due to strike.

About 50 million people from the Mid-Atlantic to Canada were in the path of the nearly 1600 km-wide storm, which forecasters said could be the largest to hit the mainland in US history.

It was expected to topple trees, damage buildings, cause power outages and trigger heavy flooding.

State governors warned of the acute danger from the winds and torrential rains.

"There will undoubtedly be some deaths that are caused by the intensity of this storm, by the floods, by the tidal surge, by the waves. The more responsibly citizens act, the fewer people will die," Maryland Governor Martin O'Malley told reporters.

The US stock market suffered its first weather-related closure in 27 years and many schools and businesses were closed in Washington DC, Baltimore, Philadelphia and New York.

While the centre of the storm was not expected to make landfall until Monday night (midday today, NZT) near Atlantic City, New Jersey, it was already creating dangerous conditions and forcing rescue workers into action.

Off North Carolina, the US Coast Guard rescued 14 of the 16 crew members who abandoned the replica tall ship HMS Bounty, using helicopters to lift them from life rafts. The Coast Guard continued to search for the two missing crew members about 260km from the eye of the storm.

The US National Hurricane Center (NHC) said the Category 1 storm had strengthened as it turned toward the coast and was moving at 30kmh.

It was expected to bring a "life-threatening storm surge," coastal hurricane winds and heavy snow in the Appalachian Mountains, the NHC said.

Forecasters said Sandy was a rare, hybrid "super storm" created by an Arctic jet stream wrapping itself around a tropical storm.

Nine US states have declared a state of emergency.

With the election eight days away, President Barack Obama cancelled a campaign event in Florida on Monday in order to return to Washington and monitor the US government's response to the storm.

"This is a serious and big storm," Obama said on Sunday after a briefing at the federal government's storm response centre in Washington. "We don't yet know where it's going to hit, where we're going to see the biggest impacts.

Sandy killed 66 people in the Caribbean last week before pounding US coastal areas as it moved north.

While Sandy does not pack the punch of Hurricane Katrina, which devastated New Orleans in 2005, it could become more potent as it approaches the US coast.

New York flooding hits Irene levels as monstrous storm yet to make landfall

Parts of Brooklyn and Manhattan have found themselves underwater as hurricane Sandy approaches New York. Flood water is already at the level of last year's Tropical Storm Irene, and the is city under a coastal flood warning.

Reuters,

26 April, 2012

Waterways in the New York metropolitan area are rising, Mayor Michael Bloomberg told a press conference organized due to Hurricane Sandy. The coastal flood warning is in place from 3 pm to 6 am local time.

Manhattan's Lower East Side and East Village districts can expect a 9-10 foot water surge at the climax of high tide on Monday night, Bloomberg warned.

Meanwhile, the surge has already hit the levels seen during Tropical Storm Irene, which hit New York last August. Pictures of flooding in the Red Hook district of Brooklyn, FDR Drive on the east side of Manhattan, and Battery Park, at the very bottom of the island, are already circulating online.

Reports say the hurricane has strengthened and developed an eye. Sustained winds have reached 90 mph.

Utility workers inspect gas lines on City Island October 29, 2012 in New York (AFP Photo / Don Emmert)

More than 375,000 people were ordered to evacuate from the city's low-lying areas. Mayor Bloomberg urged those remaining in flood zone A, to leave immediately, because “conditions are deteriorating” rapidly.

Some 3,100 evacuees are now at 76 shelters across the city, filling only about four per cent of their total capacity.

Gotham has shut down all subway, bus and train services. The city's Staten Island and East River Ferry services have been suspended.

However, Bloomberg said, buses taking people out of zone A to shelters are still running.

PATH, the train service connecting New Jersey and New York, has also been suspended until further notice.

The major tunnels in and out of the city – the Brooklyn-Battery and Holland – are also to be closed at 2 pm local time due to threats of flooding.

The city government remains open, Bloomberg stressed, taking calls about downed trees, highway flooding and other such cases.

Earlier, President Barack Obama declared a state of emergency in the state of New York. He urged citizens to take the storm “seriously” and follow local authorities' safety instructions.

A young boy rides his bike through a flooded street on October 28, 2012 in Point Lookout, New York (AFP Photo / Mike Stobe)

A woman watches waves crash onto a pier on City Island October 29, 2012 in New York (AFP Photo / Don Emmert)

Battery Park esplanade under standing water. (Image from twitter user@Newyorkist)

Flooded FDR drive at 79th Street. (Image from twitter user@ericsumberg)

Brooklyn Bridge Park along the East River New Tork City is already flooding. The storm is still a few hours. (Image from twitter user@mattdanzico)