Hanna soaks the Carolinas and steams up the seaboard

Storm inflicts little damage; all eyes turn to Ike

NORTH MYRTLE BEACH, S.C. - With a fearsome Hurricane Ike not far behind, Tropical Storm Hanna cruised ashore in the Carolinas early yesterday, bringing soaking rains and near-hurricane force winds to the coast but doing little immediate damage before pivoting quickly up the Eastern Seaboard.

Ike's top sustained winds reached 135 miles per hour, making it an "extremely dangerous" Category 4 hurricane, the National Hurricane Center in Miami said last night. The storm was moving toward South Florida and possibly into the Gulf of Mexico.

Officials in South Carolina and North Carolina said they received no reports of deaths or injuries from Hanna as of yesterday evening. Both states experienced isolated flooding, downed trees, and beach erosion.

New Englanders prepare as warnings are issued for Tropical Storm Hanna. B2

About 53,000 customers had power failures in North Carolina, many of them in inland areas where the rain was heaviest, and 1,300 lost electricity in South Carolina. About 2,000 people spent the night in shelters in the two states.

"It's been an awning here, a satellite dish there," said Kelly L. Brosky, a spokeswoman for Horry County, which includes North Myrtle Beach. "Given that inland areas got 5 to 6 inches of rain, the flooding really hasn't been anything major."

Hanna reached the Washington metropolitan area by midday, producing torrential rains. In Virginia, about 55,000 people were left without power as power lines went down with felled trees. Flash floods and accidents caused authorities to close more than 100 roads, and about 100 people were in shelters in the southeastern part of the state.

In Washington, about 500 homes and businesses were left without power, but no flash floods were reported.

Hanna made landfall along the North Carolina-South Carolina line at 3:20 a.m. yesterday. It had sustained winds of 70 miles per hour, just short of the 74 miles per hour needed to qualify as a hurricane.

The storm extended a two-week assault by tropical weather systems on the coastal South that began with Tropical Storm Fay's soggy trek through Florida and continued with Hurricane Gustav's landfall in Louisiana. The region had seen a relative respite since 2005, the year of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita.

Next comes Ike, which could still strengthen as it moves through the Atlantic. A mandatory evacuation of the Florida Keys began yesterday morning, when tourists were ordered to leave. Residents were to follow today.

Thousands evacuated the Turks and Caicos islands, a British territory, yesterday as Ike loomed off the coast, the Associated Press reported. The outer edge of the hurricane was expected to begin affecting parts of the Bahamas overnight and approach Cuba and southern Florida by early today.

At a news conference yesterday morning, Governor Charlie Crist of Florida urged residents to listen for possible evacuation orders and switch to the weather during commercials on weekend football broadcasts.