Hanna brings pummeling rain, winds — but no injuries

NORTH MYRTLE BEACH, S.C. — Tropical Storm Hanna cruised ashore in North Myrtle Beach early Saturday, bringing soaking rains and near-hurricane-force winds to the Carolina coast but doing little immediate damage before pivoting quickly up the Eastern Seaboard.

Officials in North and South Carolina said they had received no reports of deaths or injuries. Both states experienced isolated flooding, downed trees and beach erosion. Some 53,000 customers had power failures in North Carolina, many of them in inland areas where rain was heaviest, and 1,300 lost electricity in South Carolina. About 2,000 people spent the night in shelters in the two states.

The storm reached the Washington metropolitan area by midday, producing torrential rains. In Virginia, about 55,000 people were left without power as power lines went down with felled trees. Flash floods and accidents caused the authorities to close more than 100 roads.

Though not debilitating, the storm extended a two-week assault by tropical-weather systems on the coastal South that began with Tropical Storm Fay's soggy trek through Florida and continued with Hurricane Gustav's landfall in Louisiana.

Next comes Hurricane Ike, which by late Saturday had become a Category 4 storm. It is expected to move gradually through the Atlantic toward South Florida and possibly into the Gulf of Mexico.

A mandatory evacuation of the Florida Keys began Saturday morning, when tourists were ordered to leave. Residents were to follow today.