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Frustration Mounts in Wake of Hurricane Isabel
« on: Sep 21st, 2003, 2:31pm » |
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Sunday , September 21, 2003
BALTIMORE — Isabel's flight across the Mid-Atlantic was swift, but its devastation will take time to overcome: Nearly 2 million homes and businesses were still without power Sunday, debris clogged streets, and flooding left drinking water contaminated.
Long lines were forming Sunday morning in places where there was news of ice or water or hot showers available. Families began emptying refrigerators and freezers filled with spoiled food, and many faced the prospect of several days without a home-cooked meal.
Tony and Barbara Flores ventured into Richmond and found a Shoney's open for breakfast. Their daughter in St. Croix (search) had advised them to fill their bathtub with fresh water before the storm, but all the food in their refrigerator was ruined.
"Food is the bigger problem," Mrs. Floes said as she nudged her way through the line of fellow storm refugees Sunday. "We went out for breakfast yesterday and today, and otherwise we're just sandwiching it."
Federal officials warned of new flooding as runoff from the storm pours into streams.
"It's going to be quite unsafe for some time to come, until we manage to finish cleaning it up," National Park Service spokesman William Justice said after the Potomac River (search) overran its banks.
Power companies reported large gains in the arduous task or restoring service to about 6 million homes and businesses from North Carolina's Outer Banks north to New York, but nearly 2 million were still in darkness.
At least 30 deaths had been blamed on the storm, 17 of them in Virginia. North Carolina, Virginia, Maryland and Delaware were declared federal disaster areas.
Virginia was hit hardest by the loss of electricity. The state's dominant provider, Dominion Virginia Power, said it had restored service to about 800,000 homes and business by Saturday night, but still had nearly 940,000 customers without power.
"It will be multiple days," Irene Cimino, a spokeswoman for Virginia Dominion Power (search), said Sunday. "We
have an enormous task involved here. Parts of our distribution system have to be rebuilt -- not restored, rebuilt."
Flooding contaminated water supplies in many areas, forcing people to boil and treat it or risk bacterial infections.
Beachcombers in Virginia Beach made a dangerous discovery: At least 40 rounds of military ammunition that washed ashore. Police spokesman Don Rimer said people reportedly took some rounds as souvenirs, risky because officials weren't sure the explosives had been expended. Rimer asked that people with the rounds call police.
In Newport News, police reported two fires that started once power was restored. A house being remodeled sustained up to $10,000 damage to its electrical system when a tree branch lodged in the system caught fire. A fire also destroyed five apartment units and displaced 18 people, police said. The cause was under investigation.
At Yorktown, a generator that had supplied power since Thursday to 57 residents of the Regency Healthcare nursing home was refueled just hours before its tank ran dry.
Most people were taking the worst power outage in Virginia history well, said Jimmy Staton, a Dominion Virginia Power vice president, in a telephone news conference.
"Generally people can see, if they walk around their neighborhood, they understand the level of devastation," he said.
The utility had restored service to at least 24 of 29 affected hospitals , and about three-quarters of the water pumping stations that were down, Staton said.
But Richmond, 100 miles inland, is unaccustomed to such hurricane batterings. As service was restored to sections of the city, people stood in lines that snaked outside gas stations, convenience stores, groceries and coffee shops. At intersections where traffic lights were dark, horns honked and gestures were exchanged.
"Its ridiculous. We pay Vepco (Virginia Power) a heck of a lot of money. What are they doing with all that money?" asked Tom Burcher, 60, whose house in Denbeigh, in southeastern Virginia, was still without power.
On North Carolina's battered Outer Banks, which bore the brunt of Isabel's landfall, damage to the island chain's only highway hampered recovery efforts.
The North Carolina National Guard hoped to airlift Salvation Army mobile kitchens to Buxton on Hatteras Island, which was cut off from the mainland because the ocean cut through part of the highway, and to Ocracoke Island.
However, that plan had to be dropped Saturday, said Salvation Army spokesman John Edwards. The kitchens were too heavy for the helicopters supplied for the mission and they will have to be shipped out on barges, he said.
About 300 people were isolated in Hatteras Village, said Warren Judge, chairman of the Dare County Board of Commissioners.
"We are bringing in supplies as fast as we can. We're sending water, fuel, generators, and we've been getting things in since the morning after the storm," Judge said Saturday. "Their spirits are well. When you get down there you'll see they're a robust bunch of people, and we're giving them all the attention we have."
The South Branch of the Potomac crested Saturday at 9 feet above flood stage at Springfield, W.Va., where early warnings had persuaded many people to evacuate or move valuables to higher floors.
On the upper reaches of Chesapeake Bay in Baltimore's waterfront Fells Point neighborhood, known to television viewers as the site of the series "Homicide," Nadine Gussino hauled waterlogged cards and other paper merchandise out of her store, The Frame House.
"I've been wiped out," she said simply and began to cry. Water rose 3 feet deep in her shop.
Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge visited storm-damaged areas in North Carolina and in Virginia, where he walked through the silt-caked streets of the Chesapeake Bay city of Poquoson with Virginia Gov. Mark R. Warner.
"Our job is to provide the kind of hope and the kind of support that this and similar communities need," Ridge told Poquoson residents who had been laboring to clear their homes of downed trees.
Bill Boyle extended a sweaty, sawdust-covered hand to Ridge and thanked him for visiting. "We've got some extra chain saws if y'all want to help," Boyle said.
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