Hurricane Irma, which was reclassified as a tropical storm early Monday, saved some of its worst storm surge impacts for northeast Florida, coastal Georgia, and SC.
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“We thought yesterday we had a really bad storm that would impact this county severely”.
The storm, which hit the lower Florida Keys on Sunday morning before traveling up the state’s southwestern coast, has left 6.7 million Floridians without power and driven roughly 200,000 people to shelters across the state.
The island of 42,000 people is under an evacuation order.
Forecasters expect rainfall totals to range from 3 to 6 inches in coastal areas of SC to 6 to 8 inches in coastal Georgia. Hurricane-force winds extend up to 70 miles out from the center of the storm, and tropical-storm-force winds extend 185 miles. Isolated parts of central Georgia, eastern Alabama and southern SC may get up to 10 inches of rain. OPCON 1 is the highest state of emergency operations.
Those needing shelter from the hurricane have several options throughout the Carolinas, with additional shelters ready to open.
“The tide gauge in Charleston has surpassed the level reached during Hurricane Matthew, and is now at its third highest level recorded and rising”, he added.
“This time we were more prepared”, she said.
Georgia Gov. Nathan Deal already declared a state of emergency for all 159 counties as Irma barreled toward the state.
He said about 12 people remained on Harbor, but that a lot of them were leaving.
“The decision will continue to be made by the school districts themselves”.
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About 200,000 customers across SC were without power at 10 a.m., utilities reported.
As for the possibility of issuing an order to close schools statewide, McMaster said he doesn’t think that will be necessary now.
◆ An estimated 2 to 4 inches of rainfall Monday and Tuesday.
“It sounds kind of counterintuitive that we’d have that, because the center of the storm is over 200 miles away in western Georgia, and here we are over on the coast of SC”, he said.
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The remnants of the deadly hurricane are now projected to sweep into Alabama and Georgia by Monday morning, bringing strong winds and rain. Wind and rain conditions should drastically improve through Tuesday afternoon.
