Earl sideswipes NC, rains on New England

September 4, 2010 at 12:00a.m.

Associated Press

CHATHAM, Mass.

A weakening but still dangerous Hurricane Earl dumped wind-driven rain on the gray-shingled cottages and fishing villages of Cape Cod on Friday, disrupting people’s vacations on the unofficial final weekend of the short New England summer.

Packing winds of 75 mph, the storm swirled up the Eastern Seaboard after sideswiping North Carolina’s Outer Banks, where it caused flooding but no injuries and little damage. The storm passed wide of New York City, Long Island and the rest of the mid-Atlantic region but brought rain and high winds as it passed just off Cape Cod, Nantucket Island and Martha’s Vineyard late Friday night.

Vacationers pulled their boats from the water and canceled Labor Day weekend reservations on Nantucket, the well-to-do resort island and old-time whaling port expected to get the worst of the storm. Shopkeepers boarded up their windows. Swimmers in New England were warned to stay out of the water — or off the beach altogether — because of the danger of getting swept away by high waves.

Airlines canceled dozens of flights into New England, and Amtrak suspended train service between New York and Boston.

No large-scale evacuations were ordered for the Cape Cod area, where fishermen and other hardy year-round residents have been dealing with gusty nor’easters for generations.

By midday Friday, Earl had dropped to a Category 1 storm — down from a fearsome Category 4 with 145 mph winds a day earlier. By 8 p.m., Earl was a weak hurricane with maximum sustained winds just above the threshold for a hurricane. It seemed likely to be a tropical storm by the time it passed about 50 to 75 miles southeast of Nantucket.