Igor Maintains Strength, Strikes Newfoundland
Last Updated 2:28 p.m. ET
Hurricane Igor pelted eastern Canada with heavy rain Tuesday, flooding communities, washing out roads and stranding some residents in their homes.
"This is not your normal heavy rainfall flooding. It's having a major impact," said Chris Fogarty, of the Canadian Hurricane Centre. He said more than 8 inches of rain have already fallen in some regions in the past few hours.
Meanwhile, in the Pacific, a mild tropical storm formed and was expected to cross the Mexican resort area of Baja California later today.
A tropical storm warning and a hurricane watch were declared for the coast of Newfoundland, on the country's eastern coast, where people were urged to prepare for possible power failures and flooding from heavy rain.
Dennis Shea of the province's Emergency and Fire Services office said several communities have been cut off by high water and in some cases boats have been used to rescue people from their own homes. At least three towns, Clarenville, Marystown and Terrenceville, declared states of emergency because of localized flooding that made roads impassable.
Marystown Mayor Sam Synard said the storm was overwhelming his community's capacity to cope.
"We've never seen such a violent storm before," Synard said. "We've lost sections of our main roads, completely washed out to sea."
Keith Rodway, a member of Clarenville town council, said parts of his town had to be evacuated.
There have been no reports of injuries or fatalities.
Igor doggedly stayed just above hurricane strength, with maximum sustained winds of 80 mph. At 2:00 p.m. ET Tuesday, the storm center was about 75 miles north-northeast of St. John's in Newfoundland and moving to the northeast at a brisk 46 mph, the U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami said.
The Canadian company Husky Energy evacuated workers from two semi-submersible drilling rigs working the White Rose offshore oil field, spokeswoman Colleen McConnell said.
Heavy rain began in some places Monday night as a trough of low pressure over the Canadian Atlantic province interacted with tropical moisture ahead of Igor. Police reported more than 1 1/2 feet of water on one highway in the province.
The largest school board in the province closed its buildings down for at least the morning.
"We're as ready as we possibly can be ready," said Dennis O'Keefe, the mayor of St. John's, Newfoundland.
Igor left behind power outages, grounded boats and downed trees in Bermuda and kicked up dangerous surf on the U.S. Atlantic coast. After brushing past Bermuda, Igor veered away from the United States, but forecasters said it could still cause high surf and dangerous rip currents along U.S. beaches.
A 21-year-old man died while surfing in the storm-churned waves off Surf City, North Carolina, where he was pulled from the water Sunday afternoon. Last week, high surf kicked up by Igor swept two people out to sea in the Caribbean - one in Puerto Rico and another in the U.S. Virgin Islands.
Bermuda, a small British territory, when Igor passed about 40 miles to the west Monday night. High winds toppled trees and utility poles, and several boats were pushed aground, including the ferry Bermudian used to carry cruise ship passengers to shore.
Bermuda's power utility said electricity was knocked out for approximately half the island, which has 68,000 inhabitants.
In Mexico, meanwhile, authorities increased the toll of known dead to 16 from flooding and mudslides as Hurricane Karl hit the southern part of the country Friday. Looting was reported Monday in parts of the Gulf coast state of Veracruz, with people carrying bags of food out of stores in waist-deep water.
New Tropical Storms Form in Atlantic, Pacific
Meanwhile far out in the Atlantic, Tropical Storm Lisa formed early Tuesday with winds of 45 mph.
The storm is located about 530 miles west-northwest of the Cape Verde Islands off the coast of Africa.
Tropical Storm Georgette has formed in the Pacific, off the coast of Baja California in Mexico. A tropical storm warning was issued Tuesday for southern Baja California.
The storm has maximum sustained winds of 40 mph, but weakening is expected once Georgette moves inland over the peninsula later in the day.
At 11:00 a.m. PT the storm was located about 10 miles south of Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, moving north-northwest at 9 mph.