Aug 24, 2009 6:41 am US/Eastern
Say Bye-Bye To What Was Once Hurricane Bill
Click Here for CBS4 chief meteorologist David Bernard's blog
Click Here for CBS4 meteorologist Craig Setzer's blog.
MIAMI (CBS4) ―
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Surfers ride in the spotlight of a New York City police helicopter attempting to coax them out of strong waves created by Hurricane Bill on Rockaway Beach over the weekend.
Mario Tama/Getty Images
You can say 'bye-bye' to what once was Hurricane Bill.
The National Hurricane Center in Miami has issued the last advisory on the system which has now been down graded to a tropical storm as it heads out to sea.
At 5 a.m., the center of Bill was located about 190 miles northeast of Cape Race, Newfoundland. With maximum sustained winds of 70 mph Bill is moving to the east-northeast near 43 mph. It's expected to continue on this track for the next day or so as it gradually weakens.
Canadian officials have discontinued all tropical storm watches and warning for Newfoundland.
Even though Bill is no longer a tropical cyclone, it is expected to produce a large area of storms and gale force winds over the North Atlantic. Tropical storm force winds extend 315 miles outward from the Bill's center of circulation.
Hurricane Bill was responsible for two deaths as it swept along the eastern seaboard.
In New Smyrna Beach 54-year-old Angel Rosa of Orlando washed ashore unconscious from rough waves fueled by Bill. He was taken to a nearby hospital where he died.
In Maine, a 7-year-old girl died after she, her father and a 12-year-old girl were swept into the water Sunday off Acadia National Park's Thunder Hole, where tourists often gather to watch waves crash into a crevasse. At Acadia National Park, about 110 miles northeast of Portland, park officials said an estimated 10,000 people, lured by the wild ocean, converged on the park's loop road trying to get a good view of waves more than 15 feet high crashing against the rocky shore.
"The problem was there were thousands and thousands of people to try to keep an eye on," said Chief Ranger Stuart West.
The U.S. Coast Guard reported that the waves swept over 20 people. West said 11 people were taken to the hospital, mainly for broken bones after being slammed onto the rocks.
In Massachusetts, President Barack Obama and his family arrived in Martha's Vineyard on Sunday afternoon for vacation after the storm had passed well to the east.
Several people had to be rescued from the water in Massachusetts, including a couple of kayakers who got stranded in the heavy seas off Plymouth, said Peter Judge, a spokesman for the Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency.
He said strong rip tides and beach erosion were the biggest concerns Sunday.
Dozens of people showed up at South Beach on Martha's Vineyard with their cameras and camcorders to watch the big waves and churning Atlantic. Tony Dorsey of Goffstown, N.H., has a camp on the Vineyard. He said the waves came up to the top of the dunes at South Beach during high tide, and included "good-size rollers.
"It overwhelmed the beach," he said. "It reformed the beach. It's not destroyed a lot, but it's going to reshape the beach."
The storm delayed or halted ferry services from New York to Maine, and kept many beaches closed.
The storm delivered steady downpours and high winds as it moved into Canada Sunday night, forcing flight cancellations and temporary road closings along Nova Scotia's Atlantic coast. Bill ripped branches from trees in Halifax and elsewhere, and there was some localized flooding.
Click here for CBS4 chief meteorologist David Bernards's blog
Click here for CBS4 meteorologist Craig Setzer's blog.
(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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