"Our biggest fear is getting back home," Wilmington resident Karen Dries told BuzzFeed News at a hotel in Raleigh, North Carolina, where she is waiting out the storm with her husband and mother.
The family fled Wilmington on Wednesday after their son-in-law, who works in emergency management, told them, “You need to get out of here.”
But Dries is worried that road closures will keep them stuck in Raleigh, and she’s concerned about what they’ll find at home once they get there.
Three-fourths of residents in New Hanover County, where Wilmington is located, were without power around 9 a.m. local time, according to a report on PowerOutage.us.
Dries and her husband, Paul, moved from the Raleigh area to Wilmington just three months ago, and she says that their house, which is new brick construction, should be fine. She heard from a friend that their street still had electricity, but she worries that power outages in the city may last for weeks.
Power has gone out twice for Spencer Rogers, a scientist with North Carolina Sea Grant, who lives in Wilmington and decided to ride out the storm at home. Rogers told BuzzFeed News that he lost power for the first time early last night, and the electric company was able to restore it for about an hour before the power went out again.
“We heard it blow a second time,” Rogers said in an email. He expects that, at this point, the power could be down for the duration of the storm. There is “too much wind to get out the generator,” he said, “But at least the gas burner is making hot coffee."
“It’s been insane,” Steven Pfaff, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Wilmington, told BuzzFeed News. “It is just getting too dangerous” to do some outside observations, he said. The instrument detected a wind gust of 105 miles per hour earlier in the morning.
The team has been working shifts to issue flash flood alerts, forecasts, and to communicate with emergency managers on the ground about local conditions. They’re prepared to be there for days, but they’re relying on a backup generator since the power went out.
"We’re like a bunker right now,” said Pfaff. “We still have communications, which is good.”
"Our biggest fear is getting back home," Wilmington resident Karen Dries told BuzzFeed News at a hotel in Raleigh, North Carolina, where she is waiting out the storm with her husband and mother.
The family fled Wilmington on Wednesday after their son-in-law, who works in emergency management, told them, “You need to get out of here.”
But Dries is worried that road closures will keep them stuck in Raleigh, and she’s concerned about what they’ll find at home once they get there.
Three-fourths of residents in New Hanover County, where Wilmington is located, were without power around 9 a.m. local time, according to a report on PowerOutage.us.
Dries and her husband, Paul, moved from the Raleigh area to Wilmington just three months ago, and she says that their house, which is new brick construction, should be fine. She heard from a friend that their street still had electricity, but she worries that power outages in the city may last for weeks.
Power has gone out twice for Spencer Rogers, a scientist with North Carolina Sea Grant, who lives in Wilmington and decided to ride out the storm at home. Rogers told BuzzFeed News that he lost power for the first time early last night, and the electric company was able to restore it for about an hour before the power went out again.
“We heard it blow a second time,” Rogers said in an email. He expects that, at this point, the power could be down for the duration of the storm. There is “too much wind to get out the generator,” he said, “But at least the gas burner is making hot coffee."
“It’s been insane,” Steven Pfaff, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Wilmington, told BuzzFeed News. “It is just getting too dangerous” to do some outside observations, he said. The instrument detected a wind gust of 105 miles per hour earlier in the morning.
The team has been working shifts to issue flash flood alerts, forecasts, and to communicate with emergency managers on the ground about local conditions. They’re prepared to be there for days, but they’re relying on a backup generator since the power went out.
"We’re like a bunker right now,” said Pfaff. “We still have communications, which is good.”