Hurricane Isaias was downgraded to a tropical storm as it made landfall and moved inland over North Carolina late on Monday, threatening southeastern Virginia with strong winds, heavy rainfall and tornadoes.
The storm is sweeping north and posing the second tropical threat in a month to New York state.
Isaias, which might cause US$1.5 billion in losses, earlier prompted tropical storm and hurricane warnings from South Carolina to Maine, including Manhattan, with the flood threat reaching well inland and as far north as Vermont, the US National Weather Service said.
Photo: AFP
Seawater flowed into streets on the border between the Carolinas, leaving locals to wade through the flooded areas as rain and strong winds whipped the palm trees.
Three hours after reaching the coast, Isaias was downgraded to a Tropical Storm, the US National Hurricane Center (NHC) said yesterday.
Temporary flood barriers and sandbags have been deployed in New York City, particularly in the Wall Street area, to defend against the storm thrusting sea water into streets.
Photo: AFP
“We don’t think we’re going to see severe impacts from this storm, but out of an over-abundance of caution, we’ll put in several pieces in place,” New York City Commissioner of Emergency Management Deanne Criswell said.
Isaias was set to reach New York late yesterday and then drift off to northern New England and Quebec, where it was expected to fall apart by tomorrow.
The storm warning for New York City is the second this year after the city was threatened by Tropical Storm Fay early last month.
“There is certainly going to be some flooding in the eastern US,” said Don Keeney, a meteorologist with private forecaster Maxar.
Isaias is the fifth storm to strike the contiguous US this year. That makes it the earliest that tally has been reached in records going back to 1851, beating the previous mark set in 1916 by 15 days, said Phil Klotzbach, a hurricane researcher at Colorado State University.
In 1916, though, the storms that hit were stronger than most of this year’s. The most storms ever to hit the US was nine, also in 1916.
North Carolina has opened shelters for people looking to flee the storm and will screen for COVID-19 symptoms, sending anyone who tests positive to another location where they can be isolated and receive medical attention, North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper said in a tweet.
Isaias’ more westerly track will throw more cities in its path, said Chuck Watson, a disaster modeler with Enki Research. Overall, the storm should inflict about US$1.5 billion in damage and losses as it sweeps north.
“If you’re in the wrong place at the wrong time on the immediate coast of North Carolina, you could experience hurricane-force winds,” Watson said. “But it’s not likely.”
While forecasters track Isaias, they are also watching another patch of thunderstorms near the Caribbean Leeward Islands that have a 60 percent chance of becoming the season’s next storm in five days, the hurricane center said.
Kehinde Sanni spends his days smoothing out dents and repainting scratched bumpers in a modest autobody shop in Lagos. He has never left Nigeria, yet he speaks glowingly of Burkina Faso military leader Ibrahim Traore. “Nigeria needs someone like Ibrahim Traore of Burkina Faso. He is doing well for his country,” Sanni said. His admiration is shaped by a steady stream of viral videos, memes and social media posts — many misleading or outright false — portraying Traore as a fearless reformer who defied Western powers and reclaimed his country’s dignity. The Burkinabe strongman swept into power following a coup in September 2022
‘FRAGMENTING’: British politics have for a long time been dominated by the Labor Party and the Tories, but polls suggest that Reform now poses a significant challenge Hard-right upstarts Reform UK snatched a parliamentary seat from British Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s Labor Party yesterday in local elections that dealt a blow to the UK’s two establishment parties. Reform, led by anti-immigrant firebrand Nigel Farage, won the by-election in Runcorn and Helsby in northwest England by just six votes, as it picked up gains in other localities, including one mayoralty. The group’s strong showing continues momentum it built up at last year’s general election and appears to confirm a trend that the UK is entering an era of multi-party politics. “For the movement, for the party it’s a very, very big
ENTERTAINMENT: Rio officials have a history of organizing massive concerts on Copacabana Beach, with Madonna’s show drawing about 1.6 million fans last year Lady Gaga on Saturday night gave a free concert in front of 2 million fans who poured onto Copacabana Beach in Rio de Janeiro for the biggest show of her career. “Tonight, we’re making history... Thank you for making history with me,” Lady Gaga told a screaming crowd. The Mother Monster, as she is known, started the show at about 10:10pm local time with her 2011 song Bloody Mary. Cries of joy rose from the tightly packed fans who sang and danced shoulder-to-shoulder on the vast stretch of sand. Concert organizers said 2.1 million people attended the show. Lady Gaga
SUPPORT: The Australian prime minister promised to back Kyiv against Russia’s invasion, saying: ‘That’s my government’s position. It was yesterday. It still is’ Left-leaning Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese yesterday basked in his landslide election win, promising a “disciplined, orderly” government to confront cost-of-living pain and tariff turmoil. People clapped as the 62-year-old and his fiancee, Jodie Haydon, who visited his old inner Sydney haunt, Cafe Italia, surrounded by a crowd of jostling photographers and journalists. Albanese’s Labor Party is on course to win at least 83 seats in the 150-member parliament, partial results showed. Opposition leader Peter Dutton’s conservative Liberal-National coalition had just 38 seats, and other parties 12. Another 17 seats were still in doubt. “We will be a disciplined, orderly
RSS