80,000 NY homes in Irene’s direct path 119, expected, Weather, direct

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80,000 NY homes in Irene’s direct path

Hurricane Irene is expected to go ashore near the border of Nassau County and Queens at about 9 a.m., threatening some 80,000 homes worth more than $35 billion with storm surge, forecasters and analysts said.

Irene may still be a Category 1 hurricane, with winds of at least 74 miles (119 kilometers) per hour, when its center makes landfall on its way toward Canada, said Tim Morrin, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Upton, New York. The storm, packing as much as 20 inches of rain, will hit near the time when tides are high across much of the region, according to published tide tables.

“With the storm surge and the amount of water it brings, the most important aspect is to just evacuate,” said Scott Little, vice president and general manager of CoreLogic Inc. Spatial Solutions in Austin, Texas. “I don’t see a lot of change between now and the time it hits. Obviously, the lower the storm surge, the lower the damage.”

Hurricane Irene made its first landfall early yesterday on North Carolina’s outer banks, flooding roads and knocking out power to more than a million homes and businesses, according to local utilities. Five storm-related deaths have been reported.

Irene weakened as it crossed land, although it remains a Category 1 storm with winds of 80 mph. The storm was about 255 miles south-southwest of New York City, and was drenching the mid-Atlantic states with heavy rains as it skirts the Delmarva Peninsula, according to a center advisory at 11 p.m. New York time yesterday.

Hurricane at Impact

“A gradual increase in forward speed is expected during the next day or so,” according to a National Hurricane Center analysis. “Irene is forecast to remain a hurricane as it moves near or over the mid-Atlantic coast and approaches New England.”

Irene may become the most powerful storm to strike New York since Hurricane Gloria in 1985. It may inflict $6.5 billion in overall economic losses on the U.S. before being absorbed in other weather systems somewhere over Canada or the Atlantic early next week, according to estimates by Kinetic Analysis Corp. Gloria’s strength was between categories 1 and 2 when it made landfall on Long Island.

CoreLogic estimates 80,861 homes in New York City and Long Island valued at $35 billion are vulnerable to damage from storm surge if Irene remains a Category 1 hurricane. Irene may have caused between $500 million and $1.1 billion in damage to the Bahamas earlier this week, according to estimates by AIR Worldwide in Boston.

哈哈哈

哈哈哈，回来啦，没事。

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A taxi speeds by on 42nd Street at Times Square in New York as rains fall before Hurricane Irene hits August 27, 2011. Hurricane Irene charged up the U.S. East Coast on Saturday toward New York, shutting down the city, and millions of Americans sought shelter from a huge storm that halted transport and caused massive power blackouts.

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The storm still needs to be respected, said Tom Kines, senior expert meteorologist with AccuWeather Inc. in State College, Pennsylvania.

“If a thunderstorm rolls through with 50- to 60-mile-per- hour winds, we know what kind of damage that can do,” Kines said by telephone today. “It can knock a tree over or damage a house and that is just a gust. Imagine what it can do over a more prolonged period?”

No Complacency

No one should discount the storm “just because they’re not getting 100-mile-per-hour winds,” Kines said.

Transit systems in New York and New Jersey were shut down in advance of the storm and evacuations were ordered in New York, Rhode Island, New Jersey, Maryland, North Carolina and Virginia.

Hurricane warnings were posted for Cape Lookout, North Carolina, northward to Sagamore Beach in Massachusetts, including New York City, according to the hurricane center. Tropical storm warnings are in effect north of Sagamore Beach to Eastport, Maine, according to the weather service.

Wind and rain warnings were issued for parts of Quebec, New Brunswick and Newfoundland, according to Environment Canada.

Irene’s hurricane-strength winds stretch 85 miles from its center. Tropical storm-force winds of at least 39 mph extend 240 miles from the core.

The hurricane is expected to bring 6 to 12 inches of rain as it moves north and as much as 20 inches in isolated locations, according to the hurricane center. After it crosses Long Island, it will strike southern New England on a course taking it through Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Maine and into Canada.

—With assistance from Tom Moroney in Boston, Ted Richardson, Chris Burritt and Mark Niquette in North Carolina, William Selway in Washington and Henry Goldman in New York.

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Wind Differences

Amtrak will halt train operations in the Southeast, Mid- Atlantic, Northeast and New England today, according to a company release.

Irene’s winds will be stronger at higher elevations, so high-rises in New York and other major cities will experience more intense buffeting than lower structures, according to the hurricane center.

“So you have to worry about falling glass and windows being blown out,” said Bill Leatham, a meteorologist with Hometown Forecast Services in Nashua, New Hampshire.

The Northeast is also experiencing higher tides because of a new moon, so a storm surge now will be higher than it would at other times of the month, said Michael Schlacter, chief meteorologist at Weather 2000 Inc. in New York.

If Irene’s losses exceed $1 billion, it will be the 10th such costly natural disaster in the U.S. this year, a record, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The U.S. has suffered $35 billion in losses due to nine separate events so far in 2011, according to NOAA.

Emergencies Declared

President Barack Obama declared emergencies for North Carolina, Virginia, Connecticut, Maryland, New York, New Jersey, New Hampshire, Rhode Island and Massachusetts, while New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg ordered the first mandatory evacuation in the city’s history.

In North Carolina, 10 major roads were flooded after Irene made landfall near Cape Lookout, on the Outer Banks. Irene weakened from a Category 3 storm with 120-mph winds earlier in the week, and North Carolina Governor Bev Perdue said the hurricane wasn’t as powerful as first expected.