Hurricane Flo called the ‘storm of a lifetime’

‘Disaster is at the doorstep,’ governor says; millions warned they have 48 hours to flee

Category 4 hurricane Florence was less than 48 hours away from blasting into the Carolinas late Wednesday and threatened to be the “storm of a lifetime.”

“North Carolina, my message is clear,” a grim Gov. Roy Cooper said at a briefing Wednesday. “Disaster is at the doorstep and is coming in.”

Forecasters warned of catastrophic impacts, from damaging winds to flash flooding to widespread power outages.

The storm's surge, the rise in sea water above normally dry land at the coast, could be over nine feet at peak, they predicted.

Hurricane-force winds will bring down trees and damage homes and businesses.

Florence will be, in all likelihood, the most intense storm to strike the region in at least 25 years, since Hugo.

“This will likely be the storm of a lifetime for portions of the Carolina coast,” said the National Weather Service in Wilmington, N.C.

“And that's saying a lot, given the impacts we've seen from hurricanes Diana, Hugo, Fran, Bonnie, Floyd and Matthew.”

Forecasts project the centre of Florence to make landfall around the South and North Carolina border on Friday.

The National Hurricane Center is warning of a triple threat in the Carolinas:

• A “life-threatening storm surge” at the coast — a tsunamilike rise in ocean water over normally dry land.

• “Life-threatening freshwater flooding from a prolonged and exceptionally heavy rainfall event” from the coast to interior sections.

• “Damaging hurricane-force winds” at the coast and some distance inland.

Like hurricane Harvey, which stalled over Texas in 2017, Florence could linger over the Southeast U.S. for several days after landfall, unloading 38 to 64 cm of rain and isolated amounts of up to 102 cm.

Flooding from heavy rains is the second-leading cause of fatalities in tropical storms and hurricanes that make landfall.

Enough rain could fall to break North Carolina's record for a tropical storm — 61 cm— set near Wilmington during hurricane Floyd in 1999, said Greg Carbin, chief of forecast operations at the weather service's national prediction centre.

More than 1.5 million people have been ordered to evacuate coastal areas ahead of the storm because of both destructive winds and a storm surge that could place normally dry land under at least 10 feet of water.

“All interests from South Carolina into the mid-Atlantic region should ensure they have their hurricane plan in place and follow any advice given by local officials,” the National Hurricane Center said.

Federal officials warned that the millions of people in Florence's sights could be without electricity for weeks, if high winds down power lines and massive rainfall floods equipment.

There are 16 nuclear reactors in the region, and crews at the one closest to where landfall is forecast readied the station, at Brunswick, for a shutdown.

The monstrous storm has forced the closing of hundreds of schools throughout the region.

Boeing and Volvo shut down their Charleston factories, idling thousands who build 787s and sedans.

President Donald Trump has approved emergency disaster plans. “We're as ready as anybody has ever been,” he said.