Hurricane Isaias lashes the US Gulf Coast with wind and rain hours before it comes ashore

Home­own­ers gassed up gen­er­a­tors, filled bath­tubs with wa­ter and bought last-minute sup­plies along the U.S. Gulf Coast on Fri­day while Hur­ri­cane Isa­ias gained strength as it charged to­ward the beach­es of Al­aba­ma and the Flori­da Pan­han­dle.

The Cat­e­go­ry 3 storm has grown in­to a ma­jor hur­ri­cane — the first of an un­usu­al­ly qui­et At­lantic sea­son — and is ex­pect­ed to make land­fall Fri­day night.

Fore­cast­ers warned of a sig­nif­i­cant storm surge, dam­ag­ing winds, flood­ing and pos­si­bly even tor­na­does be­fore the storm los­es steam as it moves in­land and de­liv­ers strong winds and rain well north in­to At­lanta.

Trop­i­cal storm-force winds be­gan to lash the Gulf shore­line around mid­day, hours be­fore Isa­ias was ex­pect­ed to make land­fall be­tween Mo­bile Bay on the Al­aba­ma coast and the city of Des­tin in the Flori­da Pan­han­dle. The low-ly­ing coastal area is known for its pow­dery white sand beach­es dot­ted with va­ca­tion homes, wa­ter­front bars and seafood shacks.

Res­i­dents in Pana­ma City, Flori­da, braved the rain while fill­ing sand­bags Fri­day to pro­tect their hous­es.

“I mean, it’s just the na­ture of the beast. It’s Flori­da,” said Corliss Stone, who works for the fire de­part­ment.

Many will brave Isa­ias at home

One of the biggest con­cerns is a storm surge that could be as high as 6 to 9 feet (1.8 to 2.7 me­ters), ac­cord­ing to the Na­tion­al Hur­ri­cane Cen­ter. Places most at risk in­clude Flori­da’s Pen­saco­la Beach and the Gulf Is­lands Na­tion­al Seashore.

Anne Pet­zold, who lives with her hus­band in the Flori­da beach com­mu­ni­ty of Gulf Breeze, said every­one in their neigh­bor­hood planned to ride out the storm. The cou­ple in­stalled hur­ri­cane shut­ters, picked up any­thing in their yard that could turn in­to a pro­jec­tile and have two gen­er­a­tors ready if they lose pow­er.

“Every­body does what they can do, every­body asks if they need help — they ask for help, they of­fer help. All good,” she said. “It’s just an­oth­er ad­ven­ture.”

Neigh­bor Jay Brazzell said he went through a check­list of things to do, in­clud­ing stock­ing up on ice and gaso­line. He de­cid­ed to stay put be­cause Isa­ias isn’t as pow­er­ful as oth­er hur­ri­canes he’s ex­pe­ri­enced.

“I mean I’m not board­ing up,” said Brazzell, 69. “I’ve been through, this be­ing, the ninth hur­ri­cane.”

Dan­ger­ous con­di­tions are ex­pect­ed through­out the west­ern pan­han­dle, south­ern Al­aba­ma and south­ern Mis­sis­sip­pi, the Na­tion­al Hur­ri­cane Cen­ter said. Rain be­gan falling along the coast Fri­day morn­ing, and trop­i­cal storm con­di­tions were pick­ing up in the ear­ly af­ter­noon.

In a sign of how se­ri­ous the warn­ings are, dozens of Waf­fle Hous­es in the Flori­da Pan­han­dle were closed, ac­cord­ing to the com­pa­ny’s web­site. The beloved South­ern break­fast chain is known for stay­ing open through se­vere weath­er and of­ten is a mea­sur­ing stick of a storm’s sever­i­ty.

Flori­da Gov. Ron De­San­tis warned res­i­dents to ex­pect pow­er out­ages, gaso­line short­ages and clo­sures of bridges and high­ways.

As of ear­ly af­ter­noon, the storm was cen­tered about 90 miles (145 kilo­me­ters) south of Pen­saco­la and mov­ing to the north-north­east, the cen­ter said. It was pack­ing 120 mph (193 kph) sus­tained winds Fri­day morn­ing and pick­ing up speed. Cat­e­go­ry 3 storms are con­sid­ered ma­jor hur­ri­canes and are ca­pa­ble of caus­ing dev­as­ta­tion.

The whole re­gion could get soaked

Once Isa­ias comes ashore, it is ex­pect­ed to weak­en un­til it is down­grad­ed to a trop­i­cal storm by Sat­ur­day af­ter­noon, the hur­ri­cane cen­ter said.

Still, heavy rain is fore­cast as it moves in­land, with 4 to 8 inch­es (10 to 20 cen­time­ters) or even more ex­pect­ed through the week­end from south­ern Al­aba­ma to south­west­ern Geor­gia.

Isa­ias, which will be the first hur­ri­cane to hit the east­ern U.S. since Mil­ton tore up the Gulf Coast of Flori­da in 2024, al­so is ex­pect­ed to bring heavy rain and po­ten­tial flood­ing to much of the South­east over the week­end, and then to parts of the Mid­west and North­east in­to Mon­day.

Isa­ias grounds flights but like­ly to miss oil hubs

A hur­ri­cane warn­ing was in place from Ocean Springs, Mis­sis­sip­pi, to the west­ern Flori­da Pan­han­dle. Sev­er­al coun­ties an­nounced manda­to­ry evac­u­a­tions while Mo­bile, Al­aba­ma, im­posed a cur­few be­gin­ning Fri­day evening un­til morn­ing.

The storm ground­ed most Fri­day flights at sev­er­al pan­han­dle air­ports, in­clud­ing all flights in­to and out of Des­tin-Fort Wal­ton Beach Air­port. Pres­i­dent Don­ald Trump, mean­while, scrapped his plans to at­tend Sat­ur­day’s foot­ball game be­tween the Uni­ver­si­ty of Geor­gia and the Uni­ver­si­ty of Al­aba­ma in Tuscaloosa. He said he didn’t want to dis­rupt the emer­gency re­sponse.

Isa­ias was ex­pect­ed to miss the oil in­dus­try’s biggest hubs along the Gulf Coast, but fu­el prices could rise if pow­er out­ages shut down re­finer­ies for pro­cess­ing crude, in­dus­try ex­perts said.

On Dauphin Is­land, a bar­ri­er is­land off the Al­aba­ma coast, May­or Jeff Col­lier said he didn’t ex­pect ma­jor dam­age, “but at the same time, these things are very fick­le and a lit­tle jog here or there, or some last-minute in­crease in strength — we just have to be pre­pared for the worst.”

Mean­while in the Pa­cif­ic, Hur­ri­cane Si­mon be­came a Cat­e­go­ry 2 hur­ri­cane on Fri­day and was ex­pect­ed to strength­en fur­ther be­fore mak­ing land­fall in Mex­i­co this week­end.

Trop­i­cal Storm Rachel was ex­pect­ed to bring heavy winds and rain to north­ern Mex­i­co and South­ern Cal­i­for­nia this week­end. —GULF BREEZE, Fla. (AP)

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Sto­ry by SO­PHIE BATES, EM­I­LIE MEG­NIEN and JOHN SEEW­ER | As­so­ci­at­ed Press

Em­i­lie Meg­nien re­port­ed from Pana­ma City, Flori­da; and John Seew­er re­port­ed from Tole­do, Ohio. These As­so­ci­at­ed Press jour­nal­ists al­so con­tributed: Collin Bink­ley in Wash­ing­ton; Rio Ya­mat in Las Ve­gas; Ger­ald Her­bert in Pen­saco­la, Flori­da; Dave Collins in Hart­ford, Con­necti­cut; Sarah Raza in Sioux Falls, South Dako­ta; Kim Chan­dler in Mont­gomery, Al­aba­ma; Lau­ra Tur­bay in Lit­tle Rock, Arkansas; and Hal­lie Gold­en in Seat­tle.