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Jeanne Pummels Florida With Wind, Rain

Posted on: Sunday, 26 September 2004, 06:00 CDT

STUART, Fla. - Hurricane Jeanne barreled up Florida's east coast early Sunday with 120 mph wind and drenching rain, tearing off rooftops, hurling debris through the air and sending huge waves crashing into buildings. More than a million people were without power.

The Category 3 storm became the fourth to pummel Florida in a single hurricane season, something that has not happened since 1886 when Texas was the target. The three other hurricanes - Charley, Frances and Ivan - have all hit within the last month and a half, about midway through the June-to-November season.

Debris left from the other hurricanes became airborne as Jeanne made landfall shortly before midnight near the southern tip of Hutchinson Island, about 5 miles southeast of Stuart - the same area ravaged by Frances just three weeks ago.

Rain whipped sideways in sheets and sections of road were washed out by pounding waves. After coming ashore, the 400-mile diameter storm swirled into central Florida, an area saturated by rain from two previous hurricanes.

At the Ocean Breeze trailer park in Jensen Beach, roofs of mobile homes were peeled back like the lids of sardine cans. Computer printers, hair dryers and propane canisters littered the road. Metal sidings clanged in the wind.

Just down the road, Judy and Peirce Braun were relieved because their yellow and white house was basically untouched.

"I'm almost grateful," Judy Braun said Sunday. "We have all of our shingles and most of our fence."

Emergency management officials were waiting until daylight to assess damage. The previous hurricanes caused billions of dollars in damage and killed at least 70 people.

A bridge from Jensen Beach to Hutchinson Island was flooded and impassable early Sunday. Angry swells licked pieces of mobile homes out to sea.

At one of the causeway bridges leading to the barrier island, a sailboat bashed against the seawall and sank. Within minutes, all that remained above water was less than a foot of its yellow mast.

Jeanne made a turn to the north over central Florida and was expected to stay inland over Georgia and the Carolinas through Tuesday. By early Sunday, it had weakened to a Category 2 storm with 110-mph top sustained winds, but its 400-mile diameter covered most of the central part of the Florida Peninsula, including Tampa and Orlando.

Max Mayfield, director of the National Hurricane Center in Miami, said the similar paths of Jeanne and Frances were remarkable. Mayfield said it was the "first time ever that we know of" that two hurricanes landed so close in place and time.

Rainfall totals of 5 to 10 inches were expected in the storm's path, and flooding could be a major concern because previous hurricanes had saturated the ground and filled canals, rivers and lakes.

About 1.2 million homes and businesses were without power Sunday, including much of Palm Beach County. Even before Jeanne hit, some 80,000 people had no electricity in the panhandle following Ivan, and officials feared many could be without power for three weeks or more.

In Fort Pierce and Port St. Lucie, several people were rescued from homes during the relative calm of Jeanne's eye. No one was injured, but the residents "didn't think they were going to make it through the storm," St. Lucie County sheriff's Capt. Nate Spera said Sunday.

Two million people had been urged to evacuate. State officials said more than 42,500, many with homes already damaged by Frances, stayed at shelters.

"Before I left home, I prayed over my house and I told God it was in his hands," said Ada Dent, who went to a shelter in West Palm Beach with her 2-year-old grandson.

In Stuart, parts of the waterproof roof covering at Martin Memorial Medical Center blew off, said administrative nursing supervisor Sharon Andre. No injuries were reported.

Elsewhere in Stuart, part of a condominium roof collapsed. One person was rescued.

About 400 people were transferred from a shelter at an elementary school in Melbourne after parts of its roof flew off, police Lt. Jeff Koska said. No one was injured, and the evacuees were taken to another shelter, he said.

About 100 people at a similar shelter in Fort Pierce were transferred after its roof started leaking, but no one was hurt.

In Cocoa Beach about 80 miles north of Stuart, Paul and Ann Jutras weathered another storm in their reinforced house that they claimed was hurricane-proof.

Sitting two blocks from the Atlantic Ocean, the structure has two roofs - in case one is damaged.

In Frances, "we got pounded for 37 hours, but the wind would blow for about 20 or 25 minutes and there would be a lull. This one, it's just not letting up at all," Paul Jutras said.

At 9 a.m. EDT, Jeanne was centered about 15 miles southeast of Bartow and about 50 miles east-southeast of Tampa. It was moving west-northwest at 12 mph.

Earlier, Jeanne tore across the Bahamas, leaving some neighborhoods submerged under 6 feet of water. No deaths or serious injuries were reported there, but the storm was earlier blamed for more than 1,500 deaths in floods in Haiti.

Jeanne followed Charley, which struck Aug. 13 and devastated southwest Florida; Frances, which struck Labor Day weekend; and Ivan, which blasted the western Panhandle when it made landfall in nearby Alabama on Sept. 16.

Officials ran out of time to remove tall piles of debris - from branches to sodden furniture and building materials - that remained on neighborhood streets, left over from Frances.

Gas stations and businesses were boarded up and deserted, and law enforcement took to the radio airwaves, saying that anyone who was outside their homes after the 6 p.m. curfew Saturday would be jailed.

LaTrease Haliburton reluctantly checked into a West Palm Beach shelter with her 6-year-old daughter, who has had nightmares since Frances caved in the bathroom ceiling in her family's apartment.

"I want to make sure my daughter isn't as scared this time," Haliburton said.

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Associated Press writer Jill Barton in West Palm Beach contributed to this report.

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On the Net:

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

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