Irene slams into New Jersey shore, shuts down NYC

NEW YORK—A weakened but still dangerous Hurricane Irene slammed into the New Jersey shore with 75 mph (120 mph) winds Sunday after unloading a foot (30 centimeters) of rain on North Carolina and Virginia, killing eight people and knocking out power to 3 million homes.

Irene had an enormous wingspan—500 miles (805 kilometers) wide—and threatened 65 million people on the US East Coast, estimated at largest number of Americans ever affected by a single storm.

New York turned eerily quiet as the city hunkered down, crippled after the entire transit system was shut down because of weather for the first time in history. All the city’s airports were closed, with over 9,000 flights canceled. Broadway shows, baseball games and other events were all canceled or postponed.

“The time for evacuation is over. Everyone should now go inside and stay inside,” New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg warned late Saturday.

Forecasters said there was a chance a storm surge on the fringes of Lower Manhattan could send seawater streaming into the maze of underground vaults that hold the city’s cables and pipes, knocking out power to thousands and crippling the nation’s financial capital. Officials’ feared water lapping at Wall Street, ground zero and the luxury high-rise apartments of Battery Park City.

Hours before the storm’s center reached New York, a 58 mph (93 kph) wind gust hit John F. Kennedy International Airport and a storm surge of more than 3.5 feet (1 meter) struck New York Harbor.

Battery Park City in lower Manhattan was virtually deserted as rain and gusty winds pummeled streets and whipped trees. Officials were bracing for a storm surge of several feet that could flood or submerge the Promenade along the Hudson River. On Wall Street, sandbags were placed around subway grates near the East River because of fear of flooding.

In Times Square, shops boarded up windows and sandbags were stacked outside of stores. Construction at the World Trade Center site came to a standstill.

But taxi cabs were open for business.

“I have to work. I would lose too much money,” said cabbie Dwane Imame, who worked through the night. “There have been many people, I have been surprised. They are crazy to be out in this weather.”

The National Hurricane Center said Irene was 100 miles (160 kilometers) south-southwest of New York City, moving north-northeast at 18 mph (30 kph). By early Sunday, the storm had sustained winds of 75 mph (120 kph), down from 100 mph (161 kph) on Friday.

New York has seen only a few hurricanes in the past 200 years. The Northeast is much more used to snowstorms—including a blizzard last December, when Bloomberg was criticized for a slow city response.

Irene made landfall just after dawn Saturday near Cape Lookout, North Carolina, at the southern end of the Outer Banks. Shorefront hotels and houses were lashed with waves, two piers were destroyed and at least one hospital was forced to run on generator power.

The number of airline passengers affected by the storm could easily be in the millions because so many flights make connections on the East Coast.

Irene caused flooding from North Carolina to Delaware, both from the 7-foot (2 meter) waves it pushed into the coast and from heavy rain.

More than one million of the homes and businesses without power were in Virginia and North Carolina, which bore the brunt of Irene’s initial march. Then the storm knocked out power overnight to hundreds of thousands in Washington, Maryland, Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, the New York City area and Connecticut.

Eastern North Carolina got up to 14 inches (35 centimeters) of rain, according to the National Weather Service. Virginia’s Hampton Roads area was drenched with at least nine inches (23 centimeters), and up to 16 inches (40 centimeters) in some places.

North Carolina Governor Beverly Perdue said Irene inflicted significant coastal damage, but some areas were unreachable because of high water or downed power lines.

A nuclear reactor at Maryland’s Calvert Cliffs went offline automatically when winds knocked off a large piece of aluminum siding late Saturday night. Constellation Energy Nuclear Group said the facility and all employees were safe.

Irene was the first hurricane to make landfall in the continental United States since 2008, and came almost six years to the day after Katrina ravaged New Orleans.

In Philadelphia, Mayor Michael Nutter declared a state of emergency, the first for the city since 1986. “We are trying to save lives and don’t have time for silliness,” he said.

The storm hit Washington just days after an earthquake damaged some of the capital’s most famous structures, including the Washington Monument.

In New Jersey, the Oyster Creek nuclear plant, just a few miles (kilometers) from the coast, shut down as a precaution as Irene closed in. And Boston’s transit authority said all bus, subway and commuter rail service were suspended Sunday.

The deaths blamed on Irene included two children, an 11-year-old boy in Virginia killed when a tree crashed through his roof and a North Carolina child who died in a crash at an intersection where traffic lights were out. Four other people were killed by falling trees or tree limbs—two in separate Virginia incidents, one in North Carolina and one in Maryland. A surfer and another beachgoer in Florida were killed in heavy waves.

Annette Burton, 72, was asked to leave her Chester, Pennsylvania, neighborhood because of danger of rising water from a nearby creek. She said she planned to stay along with her daughter and adult grandson, although with a wary eye on the park across the street that routinely floods.

“I’m not a fool; if it starts coming up from the park, I’m leaving,” she said. “It’s the wind I’m more concerned about than anything.”

Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Corbett warned that the state will not necessarily be out of danger once the storm has passed.

“The rivers may not crest until Tuesday or Wednesday. This isn’t just a 24-hour event,” he said.—

Mitch Weiss reported from Nags Head, North Carolina. Associated Press writers contributing to this report were Tim Reynolds and Christine Armario in Miami; Bruce Shipkowski in Surf City, New Jersey; Geoff Mulvihill in Trenton, New Jersey; Wayne Parry in Atlantic City, New Jersey; Eric Tucker in Washington; Martha Waggoner and Gary D. Robertson in Raleigh, North Carolina; Jessica Gresko in Ocean City, Maryland; Alex Dominguez in Baltimore; Brock Vergakis in Virginia Beach, Virginia; Samantha Bomkamp and Jonathan Fahey in New York; and Seth Borenstein in Washington.