Chloe Riffle, 7, watches as she is surrounded by water on Sunday, Sept. 4, 2016 in the Ocean View section of Norfolk, Va. Storm system Hermine spun away from the U.S. East Coast on Sunday, removing the threat of heavy rain but maintaining enough power to churn unsafe waves and currents and keep beaches off-limits to disappointed swimmers and surfers during the holiday weekend.
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Forecasters warned swimmers and boaters along the Eastern Seaboard to stay out of treacherous waters churned up by the storm during the Labor Day holiday weekend.
“There’s no way I would even attempt to go in this water here”, one bechgoer in Maryland’s Ocean City told Retuers.
Last week Hermine made landfall in Florida as a hurricane but was quickly downgraded to a tropical storm before churning across Georgia and the Carolinas.
As of 11am, the Tropical Storm Warning was discontinued for the CT shoreline as Hermine continues to weaken.
Beachgoers say it’s hard to believe a Tropical Storm passed through just days ago in Eastern NC and some business owners say business has been great, if not better, since Hermine cleared from the Crystal Coast.
Tropical storm warnings remain in effect for most of Southeastern Massachusetts, Cape Cod and the Islands, but forecasters report that the wind speeds will be markedly weaker as Hermine further declines in strength.
The Coast Guard is once again asking mariners to use extreme caution with the storm still lingering off-shore.
NY officials have extended beach closures beyond Labor Day because of unsafe rip currents.
Temperatures were expected to dip to the 70s overnight in NY on Tuesday and Wednesday.
Widespread damage and power outages were reported from parts of Florida, which was the first state to be hit by Hermine.
Beidermann estimated the winds measured “something like 90 knots” (103 mph) and ocean swells “got up to 40 or 50 feet at one point”. Elsewhere in the state coastal roads were reported flooded, and beaches engulfed by the sea.
Hermine is tracking back towards the north-east coast of the USA after heading out to sea on Sunday and Monday. Hermine had maximum sustained winds on Sunday of 70 miles per hour, and the hurricane center said the storm was “expected to be at or near hurricane strength” before beginning to weaken on Monday night.
Moisture associated with Hurricane Newton began to surge across the Southwest.
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The extent of flooding may be related to higher sea levels stemming from global warming and natural geological processes that are making the USA east coast gradually sink, says Kevin Walsh at the University of Melbourne in Australia.
