New Jersey Sees Storm Surge Ahead of Sandy

New Jersey residents evacuate as the storm surge increases ahead of Hurricane Sandy's arrival.

Published

7 months ago

Categories

US

Topics

United States

Places

United States of America, New Jersey, Atlantic City

Transcript

ROUGH CUT - NO REPORTER NARRATION STORY: Hurricane Sandy began battering the U.S. East Coast on Monday (October 29) with fierce winds and driving rain, as the monster storm shut down transportation, shuttered businesses and sent thousands scrambling for higher ground hours before the worst was due to strike. About 50 million people from the Mid-Atlantic to Canada were in the path of the nearly 1,000-mile-wide (1,600-km-wide) storm, which forecasters said could be the largest to hit the mainland in U.S. history. It was expected to topple trees, damage buildings, cause power outages and trigger heavy flooding. State governors warned of the acute danger from the winds and torrential rains. While the center of the storm was not expected to make landfall until Monday night near Atlantic City, New Jersey, it was already creating dangerous conditions and forcing rescue workers into action. Water could be seen rising over barriers and flooding streets in Belmar, New Jersey. Most of the New Jersey coastline, including the popular beach destination of the Jersey Shore, has been evacuated. The U.S. National Hurricane Center (NHC) said the Category 1 storm had strengthened as it turned toward the coast and was moving at 18 miles per hour (30 km per hour). It was expected to bring a "life-threatening storm surge," coastal hurricane winds and heavy snow in the Appalachian Mountains, the NHC said. Forecasters said Sandy was a rare, hybrid "super storm" created by an Arctic jet stream wrapping itself around a tropical storm. Nine U.S. states have declared a state of emergency.