Unsafe flooding continued to be a threat, even as the system slowed down as it headed toward Georgia.
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Charleston is making preparations for more flooding less than a year after historic rains caused closure of the SC city’s downtown.
NASA’s Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) satellite spotted the tropical storm and noticed “intense weather conditions in Hermine’s center”, according to the agency’s officials, Live Science reports. They also are putting barricades in place in case they are needed to block off flooded streets while extra firefighters and police are being called in to deal with the storm.
Forecasters say the storm could bring 6 inches to 10 inches of rain to the area on Friday.
Hermine is expected to dump a total of five to 10 inches (12 to 25 centimeters) of rain over the southeastern United States, with possible isolated maximum amounts of 15 inches.
Florida Governor Rick Scott said the storm could lead to deaths and told residents to stay indoors until it had passed.
Residents were out in force Thursday morning to prepare for the storm and stores were already running low on bottled water and flashlights. City crews were struggling to keep up with demand for sand with sandbags.
Conditions began to deteriorate late Thursday night as winds were reported increasing to 40 miles per hour (65 kph) with driving rains knocking out power for residents in numerous coastal communities. A hurricane however can still be weakened once it touches the land, although a hurricane will die once it moves over to cool waters.
The surge of ocean water could be as high as 9 feet above normal levels, forecasters said, as authorities warned its effect was not limited to Florida. He says he’s mostly anxious about the new equipment he’s recently purchased for the waterfront restaurant.
Tropical-storm-force winds extend up to 175 miles from the storm’s center, the NHC said, warning that “the combination of a unsafe storm surge and the tide will continue to cause normally dry areas near the coast to be flooded by rising waters moving inland from the shoreline”.
Flooding was expected across a wide swath of the Big Bend, which has a marshy coastline and is made up of mostly rural communities and small towns, where fishing, hunting and camping are mainstays of life.
Keeton says he thinks his building is “pretty safe and pretty strong”.
Across the Florida line in south Georgia, about a dozen people had already showed up by Thursday evening at a Red Cross shelter that opened at a city auditorium in Valdosta that’s normally used for banquets and gospel concerts.
Hermine, expected to become the first hurricane to make landfall in Florida since Wilma in 2005, also posed a Labor Day weekend threat to states along the northern Atlantic Coast that are home to tens of millions of people. And no inbound vessels are being allowed to call until the storm passes. Fla., to the South Santee River in SC.
The storm was expected to drop back down to a tropical storm before pushing into Georgia, the Carolinas and up the East Coast with the potential for heavy rain and deadly flooding.
The storm is expected to make landfall in Florida early Friday and by early Saturday the centre of circulation should be near the Wilmington area. Pat McCrory declared a state of emergency for 33 counties in the eastern part of the state.
A hurricane warning is in effect for Florida’s Big Bend from the Suwannee River to Mexico Beach.
Less severe but still unsafe winds of up to 74 mph spanned several hundred miles as the storm barreled inland over a section of Florida’s coast that stretched from Tampa to the barrier islands south of Pensacola.
After slowing down on Wednesday Hermine had picked up speed on Thursday morning and and was moving north-northeast at 12 miles per hour.
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Hermine has been downgraded from a Category 1 hurricane to a tropical storm, according to the National Hurricane Center.
