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Sunday, March 21, 2010   59º F

Updated 09/07/2008 09:05 AM

Hanna washes N.C. with rain, wind; heads north

By: News 14 Carolina Staff

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RALEIGH -- Tropical Storm Hanna brought high winds and lots of rain but not much else as it blew ashore over touristy Carolina beaches early Saturday, then made a quick sprint northward across the eastern half of the state and up into Virginia.

The National Hurricane Center said Hanna's center came on land at about 3:20 a.m. near the North Carolina-South Carolina border. The storm had winds near 70 mph, just short of hurricane strength, but those winds quickly weakened once Hanna made landfall, and no injuries have been reported in the state.

Tornado watches were in effect until 1 p.m. for Craven, Carteret and Onslow counties, but emergency officials were already looking past Hanna to Hurricane Ike, a powerful Category 3 system with winds closing in on 115 mph.

Hanna did not cause major damage anywhere in the state. The state emergency operations center said there are no reports of flooding on any major roadways, but some localized thoroughfares have seen minor flooding.

Oak Island police reported some beach road flooding at the east and west beaches from surf overwash.

"A lot of erosion, a lot of sand dunes, washouts, overflows, those types of things. It’s not going to be the same beach it was this morning,” Oak Island fire Chief John House said.

House said the west side of the island was the hardest hit with trees down, debris in the roadway and some structural damage. The Oak Island Bridge is expected to stay open but officials did close the Sunset Beach Bridge after evacuating the area Friday afternoon.

Meanwhile, Hanna’s high winds and rain caused power outages and some minor flooding across the state.

"As the day goes on, I'm sure we're going to hear more reports of flooding as people get out and get on the roads," Julia Jarema, a N.C. Emergency Operations Center spokeswoman, said.

As of 5 a.m. Saturday, Progress Energy reported about 34,000 outages, most of which came around Wilmington in New Hanover County where there were around 20,000 outages. Onslow County, 2,600 outages, and Wake County, 1,700 outages, also saw a number of residents without power.

Based farther west, Duke Energy reported fewer than 1,100 outages statewide – 490 in Orange County, 403 in Mecklenburg County and 117 in Guilford County.

There was also some minor flooding reported across the central portion of the state as Hanna moved inward. Heavy rain fell in the Carolinas, including 5 inches in Fayetteville and the Sandhills region.

Firefighters and the National Guard evacuated about 200 people from a mobile home park in Hope Mills. It was a voluntary evacuation, but some of the flood waters snaked up mail boxes and inched closer to people's homes.

"The Lord is going to take care of it. We are going to be fine," resident Carol Dalton said.

Downtown Fayetteville also got a taste of the flooding waters. Police had to close four streets as water runoff made the roadways impassable.

In Raleigh, police had to rescue a motorist when his car stalled out on Hillsborough Street. Firefighters also issued a voluntary evacuation at the Grove Park Apartments off McNeill Street. Crabtree Creek flooded the apartment parking lot by mid-morning and threatened the area homes.

"The dealerships all moved their cars out the day before. That's a pretty good warning," resident Stephen Stokes said. "The bottom sides are brick for a reason."

Still, some residents said they planned to stay and wait out the waters.

"My next door neighbor has been here 36 years, and she's seen it all," resident Kenneth Brown said. "When she says it's time to go, I'm going to leave."

Raleigh also closed some walkways in the area around Crabtree Creek.

No rain fell to the west in Charlotte, where Tropical Storm Fay flooded streets and forced evacuations two weeks ago in a number of area neighborhoods and one apartment complex.

Hanna raced up the Atlantic coast after making landfall and was set to leave North Carolina by midday. The rain started a day earlier, and Hanna affected coastal businesses as much as it did the weather.

"All I've heard is wind, wind and more wind," said 19-year-old Dylan Oslzewski, who was working an overnight shift at a convenience store in Shallotte, N.C., about 15 miles north of the state line with South Carolina. Oslzewski said he had only had four customers compared to 30 or 40 on a typical weekend night.

The storm also was causing some travel headaches. Raleigh-Durham International Airport canceled a few dozen flights Saturday morning.

Tropical storm watches or warnings were issued from the Carolinas to Massachusetts, and included all of Chesapeake Bay, the Washington, D.C., area and Long Island. The storm has been blamed for disastrous flooding and more than 100 deaths in Haiti.

For all the talk of Hanna, there was more about Ike, which could become the fiercest storm to strike South Florida since 1992 when Hurricane Andrew did more than $26 billion damage and was blamed for 65 deaths.

To prepare for Ike that could hit the U.S. by midweek, the Federal Emergency Management Agency was positioning supplies, search and rescue crews, communications equipment and medical teams in Florida and along the Gulf Coast — a task complicated by the hurricane's changing path. Tourists in the Florida Keys were ordered to leave beginning Saturday morning.

The Associated Press contributed to this report

Hanna's impact

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