Page 4 - ARUBA TODAY

A4 U.S. NEWS
Thursday 28 sepTember 2017
Maria, again a hurricane, swirls over North Carolina beaches

Continued from Front the temporarily halted
Hatteras-Ocracoke ferry.
Its center was about 180 “We see storm after storm.”
miles (290 kilometers) off Standing near Avon’s
Cape Hatteras at 2 p.m. closed fishing pier, Meekins
Wednesday. pointed to where the dune
While Maria’s most line is gone, pounded
punishing hurricane-force down by previous storms.
winds remained offshore, At low tide, a layer of wet
tropical storm-force winds sand covered the road.
extended for as much as Maria is predicted to erode
230 miles from the center, more than half the dunes
churning up the surf on along North Carolina’s 300-
both sides of the islands. mile (485-kilometer) coast.
The hurricane’s forward Beaches in Maryland
speed is just 6 mph (9 kph), and Virginia could fare
so the storm was lingering even worse, with two-
before swinging out to sea. thirds seeing erosion and
On Hatteras, a fine rain fell the ocean washing over
Wednesday, with patches the dunes on one-third of
of blue sky occasionally them, according to the U.S.
showing through. Police set Geological Survey.
up a check point to block all All that salt water “is like
traffic except for residents Waves wash ashore hitting a house as winds and storm surge from Tropical Storm Maria lash North throwing battery acid on
and reporters. As the winds Carolinas Outer Banks as the storm moves by well off-shore on Wednesday, Sept. 27, 2017. Dare your car,” said Carrington
picked up, waves crashed County officials said the high tide flooded some roads in the area and travel is hazardous. Erhardt, who worries about
up to and beyond ocean- (AP Photo/Ben Finley) driving to the homes she
front homes between the water has washed under at high tide. Meekins, 55, a lifelong cleans. “That’s the biggest
communities of Rodanthe waterfront homes and onto “Mother Nature keeps resident of Avon who thing, is that it destroys the
and Avon, where the side streets since Tuesday chopping at it,” said Tony works as an engineer on vehicles.”q

Southern California residents head home as crews tame fire

Associated Press cause of a powerful wildfire on the ground extinguish Officials lifted evacuation Steve Concialdi.
CORONA, Calif. (AP) — returned to their homes flames that burned next orders for 600 residences Authorities were monitor-
Southern California resi- Wednesday after a fleet to suburban houses built in in the city of Corona, said ing the behavior of shifting
dents who evacuated be- of aircraft helped crews canyons. Orange County Fire Capt. winds that drove the fire
when it started Monday
and threatened nearly
2,000 residences southeast
of Los Angeles.
“If the winds pick up again,
we need to make sure that
embers don’t blow across
the fire lines and onto
properties,” Concialdi told
reporters.
More than 500 firefight-
ers helped by helicopters
and planes beat back the
flames on Tuesday.
The fire burned one home
and charred 3 square miles
(7 square kilometers) of dry
brush. It was 20 percent
contained.
At least eight schools were
closed Wednesday, mostly
due to poor air quality from
smoke that drifted 40 miles
(64 kilometers) west to the
ocean.
To the north along Califor-
nia’s central coast, a fast-
burning brush fire near Cal-
ifornia Polytechnic State
University in San Luis Obispo
briefly prompted student
evacuations before crews
brought the flames under
control.q