Thousands Flee as Gordon Hits North Florida

Hurricane Gordon downsized into a tropical storm as it made landfall Sunday evening in north Florida, but not before lashing much of the state with heavy rains and kicking up a storm surge that flooded parts of the west coast.

Residents and tourists fled inland by the thousands as Gordon churned the Gulf of Mexico on a path that took the system ashore over Cedar Key, a tiny resort island about 80 miles north of Tampa.

Sustained winds had dropped below 74 mph, the minimum threshold of a hurricane, when the center of the ragged storm blew ashore about 9 p.m. EDT.

The system spun off at least one tornado as it passed by the length of the peninsula and generated a storm surge predicted to reach nine feet in some low-lying areas.

“You just know it’s going to be a mess,” said Richard Tindall, manager of the 10-room Gulfside Motel on Cedar Key. “We’ll have about 5 feet of water in every room. I’ll lose all my interiors, all the furniture.”

Tindall said he considered hauling the furniture out of the rooms, but suddenly, “It was raining too heavy. I’m just going to lock it up and leave.”

Although weakened, Gordon is expected to live on today as a tropical storm as it spreads rainfall into Georgia and the Carolinas before pushing northeast into the Atlantic Ocean. A tropical storm watch is posted along the East Coast northward to Cape Hatteras, N.C.

Gordon is the first storm of the tropical season to strike the U.S., and Florida Gov. Jeb Bush ordered emergency teams on alert. “This storm is going to impact the entire state,” he told reporters in Tallahassee.

While forecasters emphasized the dangers of tornadoes and flooding, southern Florida water managers welcomed the rain. Low reserves in Lake Okeechobee, the main fresh water reservoir for metropolitan areas from Miami to West Palm Beach, have occasioned talk of rationing during the dry season, which begins in December.

Seaside residents of two west coast Florida counties were told to leave their homes. Voluntary evacuations were advised in several other areas around Tampa Bay, and several emergency shelters were opened.

On the other side of the state, at Cape Canaveral, officials at the Kennedy Space Center made plans to move the shuttle Discovery from the launch pad if the storm veers in that direction. The shuttle is poised for an Oct. 5 mission to the international space station.

Gordon, born out of a broad area of low pressure south of Cuba, never blossomed into a powerhouse. Strong southwestern winds above 10,000 feet sheared off the tops of thunderstorms and prevented Gordon from developing a well-defined center, said Christopher Burr, a forecaster at Coral Gables’ National Hurricane Center.

“And the latest forecast shows that it is not going to regenerate into a hurricane” when it moves off the coast of South Carolina today, Burr said.

But even without killer winds, Gordon caused anxiety and dislocation along more than 200 miles of Florida coastline. A 54-mph wind gust was reported in Tampa. Steady winds of 40 mph or more raged on Cedar Key for hours.

As storm bands well east of Gordon’s center swept through southern Florida early Sunday, a tornado was spotted west of Fort Lauderdale.

In Cross City, a town of 2,000 in the sparsely populated Big Bend area of northern Florida, southeast of Tallahassee, all 25 rooms at the Carriage Inn were filled early Sunday. Owner Mike Zombar said residents of mobile homes and those who live along the marshy coast were checking in for safety.

“It’s been so busy here I haven’t had time to prepare myself,” Zombar said. “I’m hopeful this is not going to be too bad.”

The bridge to Cedar Key and the roads to the coastal hamlet of Yankeetown were closed at midafternoon. Most residents moved inland. “We’ve got a few trees down; we lost power for a while, but water is what we’re worried about,” said Levy County Sheriff Maj. Bob McCallum.

Rains associated with Gordon caused floods and landslides that killed 19 people in Guatemala last week. More than 50 people were reported injured.