BBC: Hurricane Earl prompts US East Coast evacuations

BBC: Hurricane Earl prompts US East Coast evacuations

2 Septermber 2010

Evacuations have begun in areas of the US East Coast likely to be hit by Hurricane Earl.

The hurricane has strengthened to a category four storm again, generating sustained winds of 215km/h (135mph).

President Barack Obama said officials needed to be ready for a "worst case" scenario in a call to the US Federal Emergency Management Agency (Fema).

North Carolina's Governor Beth Perdue has declared a state of emergency.

US officials have ordered a mandatory evacuation for thousands of visitors and residents on Ocracoke Island and Hatteras Island.

Both islands are part of North Carolina's Outer Banks, a region popular with tourists.

Fema has warned people along much of the the Eastern Seaboard of the US to be vigilant and follow official bulletins.

Forecasters at the National Hurricane Center said they expected the hurricane to turn north and then run parallel to the East Coast.

They temporarily downgraded Earl to a category three storm on Wednesday, but the hurricane strengthened to a category four again later in the day.

"The most important thing for people living in Earl's potential tract to do is to listen to and follow the instructions of their local officials," Fema administrator Craig Fugate said.

Visitors to the islands of North Carolina's Outer Banks have been ordered to evacuate. Their cars are jamming up traffic on the bridge out of Hatteras Island.

But here in Atlantic Beach, a postcard-worthy vacation town just south of the Outer Banks, although the waves are up, residents and tourists are savouring the calm before the storm. They're sipping wine, munching on shrimp cocktails, and catching a few last rays before the weather turns.

Summer hurricane warnings are almost a way of life here, and locals say they're not worried, as they're prepared.

Helen Harkley, who lives in neighbouring Beaufort, says she's ready to go to a nearby school shelter to weather Earl's worst assaults. She'll take her cue from authorities and evacuation alerts.

"This is nothing new to me," she says. "If they tell you to go, you go. And if you don't - well, you'll regret it."

A hurricane warning has been issued for the east coast of the US from Bogue Inlet, North Carolina north-eastward to the North Carolina/Virginia border, including the Pamlico and Albemarle sounds.

The hurricane watch has been adjusted northward and now extends from the North Carolina/Virginia border northward to Massachusetts, including Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket.

A warning means hurricane conditions are expected somewhere within the affected area, with the first tropical storm-force winds within 36 hours. A watch expects the same within 48 hours.

The local authorities in the Outer Banks expect the storm to pass 80 miles (130km) away from the islands, meaning high winds and waves are likely.

The hurricane is currently east of the central Bahamas and is moving north-west.

On Monday the hurricane battered north-eastern Caribbean islands and Puerto Rico, causing power cuts and flooding.

Earl is being followed by Tropical Storm Fiona, currently moving north of the Leeward Isles, and Tropical Storm Gaston, the fourth tropical storm to have formed in the last 11 days.

Guardian (UK): Pakistan floods: Thousands return to historic city as levees keep water at bay

30 August 2010
Refugees displaced from Thatta by disaster complain of shortage of food and water at makeshift camp in graveyard

Thousands of people returned to the historic southern city of Thatta in Pakistan today after levees built from clay and stone held back the floodwaters that have ravaged large areas of the country.

Thousands who fled as the floods inundated nearby towns complained about a shortage of food and water as they camped in a graveyard on a hill near the city.

People ran after vehicles distributing food and water near the graveyard – a chaotic distribution system that left many flood survivors, especially the old and infirm, with nothing. Some were forced to drink rainwater from the ground.

"I cannot run after food and survive the maddening rush at this age of mine," said 75-year-old Nasima Mai, who fled with her extended family. "They throw food from the truck like animals are given food."

Authorities said they were trying to provide food and shelter to the hundreds of thousands of people camped on the hill but – as in other areas of the country – the scale of the disaster has overwhelmed both local capacity and the international partners trying to help.

"We are trying to set up a tent city in different parts of Makli so that the distribution [of aid] could be organised," said Hadi Baksh, a disaster management official in the southern province of Sindh.

The floods started around a month ago in the north-west after extremely heavy monsoon rains, and have surged south along the Indus river, devastating towns and farmland. More than 1,600 people have died and 17 million more have been affected by the disaster.

Authorities in Thatta built the new levees across a major road to hold back the waters that swamped the nearby town of Sujawal. Many of Sujawal's 250,000 residents had already fled, but the floods damaged buildings throughout the town.

Many of Thatta's 350,000 residents had also evacuated the city in recent days, but began to return as the danger passed, Baksh said, adding: "We have raised the level of the ground and constructed a levee on the bypass to stop the water, and now the chances are very low that the water might run into the city."

Thatta contains several well-known mosques, including one built by Shah Jahan, the ruler of the Mughal empire in India in the 1600s.

Water levels are beginning to drop in Sindh as the floodwaters flow down the Indus river into the Arabian sea, Baksh said. "In the coming days, the towns and villages will be out of flood danger," he added.

But even after the floodwaters recede, Pakistan will be left with a huge relief and reconstruction effort that will cost billions of dollars and is likely to take years.

Muslim countries, organisations and individuals have pledged nearly $1bn (£646m) in cash and relief supplies to help Pakistan respond to the floods, Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, the head of the 57-member Organisation of the Islamic Conference, said.

Other countries such as the US and Britain have also pledged millions of dollars, but many officials fear Pakistan will still lack the funds necessary to recover from the worst natural disaster in its history.

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