Hurricane Erin Hits Florida Coast : Weather: Storm’s leading edge comes ashore just south of Vero Beach. State’s midsection is pounded by 85-m.p.h. winds, heavy rain.

Bands of rain and high winds lashed the Florida coastline early today as Hurricane Erin swept ashore.

The leading edge of the storm made landfall shortly after 1 a.m. EDT just south of Vero Beach, the National Hurricane Center said.

“As the center crosses they can expect three to four hours of the maximum effects of the winds,” said Jerry Jarrell, a hurricane specialist at the National Hurricane Center in Miami.

The storm was clobbering the state’s midsection with sustained winds of 85 m.p.h. and gusts as high as 100 m.p.h. The heavy rain was considered a greater threat than the destructive winds.

The storm’s slow approach and northward drift through the day Tuesday served to virtually paralyze all of Florida’s east coast. Thousands of businesses, including stores, shopping malls, banks and universities were closed. Up to 400,000 people were evacuated from their homes along the state’s barrier islands and low-lying areas in advance of the storm.

In South Florida, where many residents will never forget the 145-m.p.h. horrors of Hurricane Andrew three years ago, some storm shutters remained up even as the storm moved well to the north and skies began to clear.

As the trajectory of Erin shifted northward, most of the anxiety and rush to get ready went northward too. Evacuation orders were canceled in Miami Beach and other coastal areas. The Clevelander Hotel in Miami Beach, which had evacuated guests but kept its bar and restaurant open, put the awnings back up on its patio and a party started immediately.

All along Florida’s east coast, groceries and building supply outlets were mobbed, and as the weather outside deteriorated, managers kept their employees only as long as seemed reasonable.

“Employees have been asking to leave early all day,” said Fred Albury, manager of a Publix supermarket in West Palm Beach. “We’re letting go as many as we can.”

At midafternoon, there was not a single car in the parking lot of the Palm Beach Mall.

Ft. Lauderdale, West Palm Beach, Jupiter, Port St. Lucie, Vero Beach--all heard their names called Tuesday as forecasters at the National Hurricane Center in Miami revised their predictions as to Erin’s final destination.

Many cities along the populated corridor that parallels Interstate 95 looked like ghost towns by midafternoon. On I-95 itself, usually one of the busiest freeways in the United States, relatively few cars swooshed through the lowering clouds and sudden bursts of fine-point rain that blew in from east to west.

At Ft. Lauderdale International Airport, where all flights were suspended at 1 p.m. Tuesday, employees of rental car agencies backed their idled shuttle vans up against the glass-walled offices for protection from wind gusts and flying debris.

By 5:30 p.m., emergency management officials in Orlando announced that all shelters were full. Two hours later police blocked all highways from the Orlando area to beaches at Melbourne and Cocoa Beach.

Rainfall of up to 10 inches was expected in a wide band on either side of Erin’s eye. Officials feared heavy flooding because the ground is already saturated by unusually heavy summer rainfall.

By early evening, as it became clear that South Florida had escaped the brunt of the hurricane, officials announced that schools in Dade County would reopen today and that people who had evacuated would be allowed to return to their homes.

Earlier, although the Miami-Ft. Lauderdale area looked eerie with highways and streets empty of traffic and with many businesses and homes boarded up, there was a sense of unreality about the potential danger. It was hard to get worked up with the sun shining brightly on a typically beautiful Miami day.

Surfers and swimmers flocked to the beaches to frolic in the unusually choppy waters as the hurricane neared land. In the early afternoon, in the park beside the marina in Coconut Grove, children played under the gathering clouds. Families picnicked, lovers embraced and loungers soaked up the last rays of sun before the storm.

A few restaurants in the entertainment district of Coconut Grove remained open despite the hurricane warning. “We’ll stay open until it gets really bad,” said Tanya Fidowski, a waitress facing her first hurricane after recently relocating from Los Angeles. “But right now,” she said, “it’s a little cloudy, a little rain--it’s nice.”

After the devastating impact of Hurricane Andrew, which barely missed heavily populated Miami in 1992 and caused 25 deaths and $30 billion in damage in the city’s southern suburbs, many South Floridians took this hurricane warning seriously.

But anticipated traffic jams never materialized as many people ignored orders to evacuate coastal zones. A spokeswoman for the Emergency Management office in Dade County, where Miami is located, said only 1,000 people moved into public shelters. Neighboring Broward County, where Ft. Lauderdale is located, closed some shelters as only 2,000 people showed up.

“People are accustomed to hurricanes and they’re waiting for a time closer to the hurricane to evacuate,” said Miami Beach Mayor Seymour Gelber. “We’re veterans at this.”

As Erin veered north, the hurricane warning was lifted at 2 p.m. on the Florida Keys, a 100-mile necklace of islands where evacuation is always problematic.

Clary reported from Palm Bay and Harrison from Miami. Researcher Anna M. Virtue also contributed to this story.