Hurricane Sandy rapidly closing on eastern U.S.

Hurricane Sandy is swiftly approaching southern New Jersey and Delaware, bringing high winds, heavy rain and a "life-threatening" storm surge, U.S. forecasters say.

Many coastal communities are already dealing with flooding, including areas along New Jersey's coast. Mass transit in several cities — including New York — has been shut down, more than 7,000 airline flights are cancelled, schools have closed and the floor of the world's biggest stock exchange went silent on Monday.

More than one million are already without power, Reuters reported, with many more expected to lose power as high winds lash the coast.

The hurricane, which has maximum sustained winds of 150 km/h, was located about 65 kilometres south of Atlantic City, N.J., the U.S. National Hurricane Center said in a statement released at 5 p.m. ET.

Sandy is expected to make landfall near New Jersey and Delaware early in the evening, U.S. forecasters said, bringing a "life-threatening storm surge and hurricane-force winds."

State and city officials across the affected area issued warnings and recommendations for people in the path of the powerful storm.

"This storm is causing a great deal of damage. Especially on the New Jersey coastline," New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie said on Twitter.

Christie said he spoke with U.S. President Barack Obama earlier in the day to discuss the state's needs as the storm approached.

In a news conference, Christie expressed concern that some people in coastal areas had not followed orders to evacuate.

"I hope and pray there will not be a loss of life because of people's decisions to stay," he said on Twitter.

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg said in an early evening news conference that "the most severe" part of the storm is beginning.

"The city is still very much within the danger zone," he said, noting that already strong winds were expected to strengthen through the evening."

He said the greatest danger posed by Sandy is the storm surge and the coastal flooding it will produce, and he reminded people to stay away from beaches, boardwalks, seawalls and roads along the water.

"Conditions are going to be very dangerous outside," he warned, noting that winds and storm surges were expected to get worse before they get better.

In Manhattan, a crane partially collapsed. The CBC's David Common estimated about 150 firefighters were on the scene. People in surrounding buildlings were initially ordered to stay in their buildings, but the mayor later said they'd been moved out.

In Delaware, Gov. Jack Markell said an emergency response plan was in place to help people affected by the storm.

In all, roughly 50 million people are threatened as Hurricane Sandy is expected to make landfall along the New Jersey coast and then collide with two other weather systems.

That's anticipated to create a superstorm in the most heavily populated corridor of the U.S., with the potential for havoc over an area stretching more than 1,250 kilometres from the East Coast to the Great Lakes.

"The biggest threats to life in the U.S. northeast will be first the surge, with coastal flooding, then the wind — loss of power for millions — followed by inland flooding from rain and, just west of the Appalachians, heavy snow," CBC meteorologist Jay Scotland said.

Scotland said what's particularly troublesome about Hurricane Sandy is its immense size, the number of people it will affect and a mass of cold air that could enhance precipitation.

"Hurricane force winds extend as much as 300 kilometres outward from the storm's centre and tropical force winds extend up to over 800 kilometres," Scotland said earlier Monday. "With this large of a wind field, widespread power outages will likely be the most notable impact from Sandy, with millions potentially left without power — which could remain out for days."

Already the storm has caused flooding from North Carolina up the coast to eastern Long Island, N.Y. In Virginia Beach and Norfolk, Va., streets were inundated, marooning cars in more than half a metre of water. The surging Atlantic Ocean overwhelmed a highway on Hatteras Island in North Carolina and washed over the main street in Sea Bright, N.J.

There was also road flooding in the New York City borough of Queens, as well as floodwater coursing through neighbourhoods and gushing into homes on Fenwick Island.

Forecasters are warning that the New York area could get the worst of it — a three-metre wall of water.

New York, Philadelphia, Washington and Baltimore have shut down their subways, buses and trains, and schools are closed. Boston also called off school. And all non-essential government offices are closed in Washington, D.C.

Two of the tunnels connecting Manhattan to Brooklyn and New Jersey closed at 2 p.m. Monday as a precautionary measure. Authorities are concerned that the Holland Tunnel and Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel will take on water.

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo said another major concern is floodwaters entering the New York City subway, where the salt water from the Atlantic Ocean could cause corrosion to train brakes, track control systems and power lines.

"Citizens have a duty in this too," Cuomo said. "They need to be smart, they need to use common sense. Citizens do not need to be on the road — they need to leave the roads free" for emergency vehicles, he added.

The New York Stock Exchange was shut down for Monday, including electronic trading. Nasdaq shut the Nasdaq Stock Market and other U.S. exchanges and markets it owns, although its exchanges outside the U.S. operated as scheduled.

Several companies have postponed reporting their earnings as a result, including Pfizer Inc. and Thomson Reuters.

As rain from the leading edges of the monster hurricane began to fall over the U.S. northeast, hundreds of thousands of people from Maryland to Connecticut were ordered to evacuate low-lying coastal areas, including at least 375,000 in lower Manhattan and other parts of New York City, 50,000 in Delaware and 30,000 in Atlantic City, N.J., where the city's 12 casinos were forced to shut down for only the fourth time ever.

"I think this one's going to do us in," said Mark Palazzolo, who boarded up his bait-and-tackle shop in Point Pleasant Beach, N.J., with the same wood he used in past storms, crossing out the names of Hurricanes Isaac and Irene and spray-painting "Sandy" next to them.

"I got a call from a friend of mine from Florida last night who said, 'Mark, get out! If it's not the storm, it'll be the aftermath. People are going to be fighting in the streets over gasoline and food,'" Palazzolo said.

Common, reporting from Manhattan, said the big problem there isn't necessarily rainfall but the storm surge and resulting flooding.

"Streets flooding, homes flooding, rivers running over their banks and spilling off into other neighbourhoods — that's the big concern," Common said. "That's why we've seen these mandatory coastal evacuations and mandatory evacuations in the city for low-lying areas."

Shows on Broadway and at New York's Carnegie Hall were cancelled Sunday night and Monday, amid the risk that theatregoers would be stranded by the transit shutdown.

Sandy was blamed for at least 65 deaths in the Caribbean before it began travelling northward, parallel to the eastern seaboard.

After it makes landfall, it's expected to cut across into Pennsylvania and travel up through New York State on Wednesday.

Forecasters said the combination of Sandy and the two other weather systems could bring close to 300 millimetres of rain in places, a potentially lethal storm surge of one to three metres across many of the coastal areas, and punishing winds that could cause widespread power outages that last for days. The storm could also dump up to 60 centimetres of snow in Kentucky, North Carolina and West Virginia.

The storm surge will be exacerbated by a full moon, which elevates tides and ocean waves.

Earlier in the day, Bloomberg warned: "If you don't evacuate, you are not only endangering your life, you are also endangering the lives of the first responders who are going in to rescue you. This is a serious and dangerous storm."

New Jersey's famously blunt governor was less polite: "Don't be stupid. Get out."

The United Nations said it would close its headquarters in Manhattan on Monday and cancelled all meetings there.

In Washington, Obama declared emergencies in Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania, authorizing federal relief work to begin well ahead of time. He promised the government would "respond big and respond fast" after the storm hits.

"My message to the governors as well as to the mayors is anything they need, we will be there, and we will cut through red tape. We are not going to get bogged down with a lot of rules," he said.