2nd fatality tied to hurricane as new storms form
ORANGE BEACH, Ala. — A second death from Hurricane Sally was reported Friday in Alabama on a day that also saw the National Hurricane Center have to resort to using the Greek alphabet for storm names in a recordsetting season.
Baldwin County coroner Brian Pierce said the death in the Foley area was of someone who was involved in storm cleanup. He provided no other details. Another person in the county died Wednesday in an apparent drowning as the hurricane roared across the region.
In Florida, authorities are still searching for a missing kayaker who was feared dead, Escambia County Sheriff David Morgan said. The U.S. Coast Guard is looking for the man who went out on the day of the storm, he said.
“We’ve been telling everyone how fortunate we are about not having any deaths. We may have our first hurricanerelated death as a result of it,” the sheriff said.
Hundreds of thousands of people were still without power Friday along the Alabama coast and the Florida panhandle in the aftermath of Sally. Officials continued to assess millions of dollars in damage that included ships thrown onto dry land.
A section of the main bridge between Pensacola and Pensacola Beach collapsed after it was hit by a barge that broke loose during the storm.
At a downtown marina, at least 30 sailboats, fishing boats and other vessels were clumped together in a mass of fiberglass hulls and broken docks. Some boats rested atop sunken ones.
Meanwhile off the coast of Portugal, Subtropical Storm Alpha formed. It is only the second time the Hurricane Center has had to use the Greek alphabet after running out of its traditional storm names. The only time they had done this before was in the deadly 2005 hurricane season, during which Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans.
The onslaught of hurricanes has focused attention on climate change, which scientists say is causing wetter, stronger and more destructive storms.
Alpha sloshed ashore in Portugal later Friday. On Friday afternoon, yet another system in the western Gulf of Mexico became Tropical Storm Beta.
Alpha came within hours of Tropical Storm Wilfred also forming in the eastern Atlantic, using the last of the traditional names for tropical systems. Slight strengthening of the storm is possible but weakening should start over the weekend, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said.