It’s looking like Tropical Storm Hanna is gaining strength and continuing on course to the Southeast U.S. Coast:
Authorities from Florida to Virginia braced today for Tropical Storm Hanna, the leading blow in a potential one-two punch in the coming days as a much more powerful system rampages across the Atlantic in its wake.
Hanna, which forecasters say could become a Category 1 hurricane tomorrow before reaching the U.S. southeastern coast, is currently lashing the Bahamas with heavy rains and 65 mph sustained winds after leaving more than 60 people dead in Haiti from flooding and mudslides.
In its latest forecast, the Miami-based National Hurricane Center said the eye of the storm will be near the southeast U.S. coast by late Friday, although rains and winds associated with Hanna will reach shore well before then. Tropical-storm-force winds extend outward from Hanna’s eye up to 315 miles, it said.
The center issued a hurricane watch for the area between Edisto Beach, S.C., and Ocracoke Inlet, N.C. A tropical storm watch is in effect from Edisto Beach south to Altamaha Sound, Ga.
If Hanna stays on its latest projected path, its center is expected to make landfall just north of Wilmington, N.C., before 8 a.m. Saturday, then skirt the Atlantic Coast over the next 24 hours or so.
In Virginia, Gov. Timothy M. Kaine (D) declared a state of emergency this morning and directed state agencies to take action to protect Virginians from the effects of Hanna.
“Current forecasts predict Hanna will bring tropical storm force winds to Virginia, causing coastal flooding and the very real possibility of tornadoes and power outages,” Kaine said in a statement. “Virginians should listen to their local government representatives and local news media for instructions for the duration of the storm.”
Kaine later told reporters that the Virginia coast could be hit with winds of 40 to 60 mph, rainfall of two to four inches and tides two to four feet above normal. But he said there are no plans to evacuate coastal residents.
Southeastern Virginia’s Hampton Roads area could face the worst of Hanna, with “minor to moderate flooding” and the prospect of tornadoes, he said.
According to current predictions, “it would not be one of the more severe storms we’ve had,” Kaine said. “But we just have to keep assessing the path the storm is on and whether it increases in strength at all.”
Here in Northern Virginia, it looks like we’ll just end up with a lot of rain, which wouldn’t really be a bad thing.
