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Hurricane Arthur loses strength | |
(about 14 hours later) | |
Hurricane Arthur has weakened in strength after hitting North Carolina's barrier islands overnight, causing thousands of homes to lose power. | |
The US National Hurricane Center said the maximum sustained winds dropped to 90mph (145km/h) as it pulled away from North Carolina and moved offshore. | |
It was downgraded to a Category One storm on Friday morning. | |
Thousands of people were forced to abandon their 4 July plans and there are now flooding fears. | |
Towns all along the state's coast have rescheduled Independence Day events and fireworks, and some cities further north up the East Coast held their festivities a day early. | |
The storm is expected to arrive in Nova Scotia, Canada, on Saturday after first passing east of New England. | |
At its peak, winds of 100 mph caused power cuts in 20,000 homes as Arthur came ashore at 23:15 local time (03:15 Friday GMT) over the southern end of the Outer Banks, which are a 200-mile string of narrow barrier islands. | |
At the time, Robin Nelson, who lives with her husband and two sons in Newport, was speaking on the phone to CNN and she described how her house - in the path of the eye of the storm - clattered in the winds. | |
"It's howling pretty good here," she said. "You can hear it coming across the sound." | |
Most of the power cuts were in Carteret County, but power was restored to 4,000 households by daybreak. There were fierce winds and horizontal rain. | |
The National Hurricane Center said the first hurricane of the Atlantic season had caused powerful tidal surges and dumped 15cm (6ins) of rain. | |
There have been no reports of major structural damage so far. | |
The islands are susceptible to high winds, rough seas and road-clogging sands, prompting an exodus that began on Wednesday night. | |
Thousands left the area, and ferries and highways were packed. | |