Authorities fear that despite weakening winds, Hurricane Florence is growing in size as it slowly nears the East Coast in the US.
Authorities have warned people who stayed back despite evacuation orders that this is the last good day to leave. "You put your life at risk by staying," North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper said. "Don't plan to leave once the winds and rains start." He has warned residents that they are on their own if they refuse to leave. More than one million people were ordered to evacuate as the hurricane crept closer to Carolina.
According to a CNN report, authorities of the Carolina Beach stopped traffic to the island via the only bridge connecting it to the mainland. Officials worry that as many as 1,000 of the town's 6,300 residents are staying in the town, which is less than 5 feet above sea level.
The center of Florence, no longer classified as a major hurricane but still posing a grave threat to life and property, is expected to strike North Carolina’s southern coast on Friday, then drift southwest along the shoreline before moving inland on Saturday, according to the National Hurricane Center (NHC) in Miami.
The storm’s maximum sustained winds were clocked late on Wednesday at 110 miles per hour (175 kph), down from a peak of 140 mph a day earlier, before it was downgraded to a Category 3, then a Category 2, on the five-step Saffir-Simpson scale of wind strength.
“While Florence has weakened below major hurricane intensity, the wind field of the hurricane continues to grow in size,” the NHC said in its latest bulletin.
A long stretch of the US Eastern Seaboard remained vulnerable to hurricane and tropical storm conditions, from Georgia north through the Carolinas into Virginia. And Florence remained capable of unleashing rain-fueled catastrophic flooding of rivers and low-lying areas across a wide region.
