Wilma Heads for Fla. With 105-Mph Winds

By DAVID ROYSE

KEY WEST, Fla. – Hurricane Wilma accelerated toward storm-weary Florida on Sunday, threatening residents with 105-mph winds, tornadoes and a surge of seawater that could flood the Keys and the state’s southwest coast.

After crawling slowly through the Caribbean for several days, Wilma pulled away from Mexico’s Yucatan peninsula as a Category 2 storm and, forecasters said, began picking up speed “like a rocket” as it headed toward the U.S. mainland. The storm was expected to make landfall around dawn Monday.

The southern half of the state was under a hurricane warning, and an estimated 160,000 residents were told to evacuate, although many in the low-lying Keys island chain decided to stay.

“I cannot emphasize enough to the folks that live in the Florida Keys: A hurricane is coming,” Gov. Jeb Bush said. “Perhaps people are saying, ‘I’m going to hunker down.’ They shouldn’t do that. They should evacuate, and there’s very little time left to do so.”

Forecasters expected flooding from a storm surge of up to 15 feet on Florida’s southwest coast and 8 feet in the Keys. Tornados were possible in some areas through Monday.

Max Mayfield, director of the National Hurricane Center in Miami, predicted Wilma would dramatically pick up speed as it approached Florida.

“It’s really going to take off like a rocket,” he said. “It’s going to start moving like 20 mph.”

Wilma would mark Florida’s eighth hurricane since August 2004 and the fourth evacuation of the Keys this year.

Only about 20 percent of the Keys’ 78,000 residents fled, according to Billy Wagner, senior emergency management director for Monroe County.

“If they don’t get out of there, they’re going to be in deep trouble,” he said.

There was sunshine Sunday morning in the Keys and even some recreational boaters as many residents went about their normal routines.

“We were born and raised with storms, so we never leave,” Ann Ferguson said from her front porch in Key West. “What happens, happens. If you believe in the Lord, you don’t have no fear.”

Some 100 Key West parishioners attended mass at a Catholic church where a grotto built in the 1920s is said to provide protection from dangerous storms. Ray Price took his usual stroll down Duval Street to check out the ocean.

“Another day in paradise,” Price said.

Some people shared that attitude on the mainland. At a park for recreational vehicles in Fort Myers Beach, Leonard Hasbrouck stood bare-chested as a fire truck rolled by blaring a warning.

“Mandatory evacuation,” a firefighter shouted into a loudspeaker. “You are hereby ordered to leave your residence by the board of county commissioners of Lee County, Fla.”

“They came by yesterday,” Hasbrouck said. “I told them, ‘I’m not going to ask you to rescue me.’”

Tropical storm-force winds of at least 39 mph were expected to begin lashing the state late Sunday, and the core of the hurricane was forecast to slice across the peninsula Monday, speeding northeast at up to 25 mph.

Gov. Bush said state officials expected heavy rain and widespread power outages. The National Guard was on alert, and state and federal officials had trucks of ice and food ready to deploy.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency was poised to send in dozens of military helicopters and 13.2 million ready-to-eat meals if needed, spokesman Butch Kinerney said.

“We’re ready for Wilma and, whatever the storm brings, we’re set to go,” Kinerney said.

Wilma killed at least three people along Mexico’s Caribbean coast, where resort hotel lobbies were gutted and 3 feet of water blocked highways. Then the storm made a hard turn east toward Florida and gained speed.

Because the storm was expected to move so swiftly across Florida, residents of Atlantic coast cities such as Miami and Fort Lauderdale were likely to face hurricane-force winds nearly as strong as those on the Gulf Coast.

George Delgado of Miami was still covering the windows of his house with plywood Sunday. He said he waited until the last minute to make sure the hours of work were necessary.

“I was hoping it would turn some other way,” Delgado said.

At 5 p.m. EDT on Sunday, Wilma was centered about 210 miles west-southwest of Key West and moving northeast at about 14 mph. Hurricane-force wind of at least 74 mph extended up to 85 miles from the center and wind blowing at tropical storm-force reached outward up to 230 miles, the hurricane center said.

Weary forecasters also monitored Tropical Depression Alpha, which formed Saturday off the Dominican Republic and was briefly a tropical storm, the record 22nd named storm for the Atlantic season. It was the first time the hurricane center exhausted the regular list of names and had to turn to the Greek alphabet.

Alpha was not considered a threat to the United States.

On Florida’s Gulf Coast, evacuation orders covered barrier islands and coastal areas in Collier and Lee counties, such as Fort Myers Beach, Marco Island, Sanibel and parts of Naples.

Visitors crossing the bridge into Marco Island Sunday were greeted by an electric sign that flashed, “EVACUATE, EVACUATE.”

About 3,500 people were in shelters across the state, including roughly 850 people at the Germain Arena near Fort Myers, where evacuees pitched tents and set out mat on the ice rink where a minor-league hockey team plays. Cots and sleeping bags lined hallways outside the rink.

Jean Moore of Fort Myers found a spot near the restroom. She was worried about coming to an arena after seeing the bedlam at the New Orleans Superdome during Hurricane Katrina.

“After New Orleans and all the horror stories that came out of that facility, I’m surprised to find things so calm here,” she said. “As you can see, even the children are calm. They’re not rowdy or screaming. I’m just amazed at how quiet it is.”

David Bright sat nearby on a chair, a Bible beside him. He’s old enough to remember plenty of other hurricanes, including destructive Donna in 1960.

“I’m just doing a lot of praying that things will work out,” he said. “I’m born and raised right here in Fort Myers, Fla., and just know you don’t play with them.”

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Associated Press writers Allen Breed in Fort Myers, Mike Schneider in Naples, Melissa Trujillo in Oakland Park, and Ron Word and Brent Kallestad in Miami contributed to this story.

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On the Net:

National Hurricane Center: http://www.nhc.noaa.gov