Tag Archives: Hawaii

Commander says U.S. may need stronger defense against North Korea missiles

The Commander of the U.S. Pacific Command, Admiral Harry Harris, testifies before a House Armed Services Committee hearing on "Military Assessment of the Security Challenges in the Indo-Asia-Pacific Region" on Capitol Hill in Washington, U.S, April 26, 2017. REUTERS/Yuri Gripas

By Phil Stewart and David Brunnstrom

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The top U.S. commander in the Pacific told Congress on Wednesday the United States may need to strengthen its missile defenses, particularly in Hawaii, given the advancing threat from North Korea’s missile and nuclear weapons programs.

Just before the entire U.S. Senate was due to receive a top-level briefing on North Korea at the White House, Admiral Harry Harris said he believed Pyongyang’s threats against the United States needed to be taken seriously.

Graphic – Carl Vinson strike group: http://tmsnrt.rs/2pqOMWA

Graphic – North Korea’s nuclear program: http://tmsnrt.rs/2n0gd92

Earlier on Wednesday, the U.S. military moved parts of an anti-missile defense system to a deployment site in South Korea, triggering protests from villagers and by China – whose help is vital to agreeing and implementing tougher economic sanctions to try to persuade North Korea to abandon its weapons programs.

North Korea’s growing nuclear and missile threat is perhaps the most serious security challenge confronting U.S. President Donald Trump. He has vowed to prevent North Korea from being able to hit the United States with a nuclear missile.

Harris told lawmakers the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system would be operational “in coming days.”

He said the defenses of Hawaii were sufficient for now but could one day be overwhelmed, and suggested studying stationing new radar there as well as interceptors to knock out any incoming North Korean missiles.

“I don’t share your confidence that North Korea is not going to attack either South Korea, or Japan, or the United States … once they have the capability,” Harris told one lawmaker.

Washington and Pyongyang have stepped up warnings to each other in recent weeks amid concerns that Pyongyang may soon conduct a sixth nuclear bomb test.

Washington has said all options are on the table, including military strikes, but officials have stressed that the current focus is on stepped-up sanctions on North Korea, which are expected to be discussed at a U.N. Security Council meeting on Friday chaired by U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson.

Harris’s testimony was the latest sobering reminder of growing U.S. alarm about North Korea. The country has yet to test a missile capable of reaching the United States, but experts say it could have the capability some time after 2020.

U.S. officials have warned that a conflict with North Korea could have a devastating effect on ally South Korea and U.S. troops based there, a point Pyongyang underscored by a big live-fire exercise on Tuesday to mark the foundation of its military.Harris conceded that North Korean retaliation to any U.S. strikes could cause many casualties in South Korea, but added that there was the risk “of a lot more Koreans and Japanese and Americans dying if North Korea achieves its nuclear aims and does what (North Korean leader Kim Jong Un) has said it’s going to do.”

North Korea has vowed to strike the United States and its Asian allies at the first sign of any attack on its territory.

SHOW OF FORCE

In a show of force, the United States is sending the USS Carl Vinson aircraft carrier group to waters off the Korean peninsula, where it will join the USS Michigan, a nuclear submarine that docked in South Korea on Tuesday. South Korea’s navy has said it will hold drills with the U.S. strike group.

Harris said the carrier was in the Philippine Sea, within two hours’ striking distance of North Korea if need be.

The earlier-than-expected steps to deploy the missile defense system were denounced both by China, where the foreign ministry vowed Beijing would “resolutely take necessary steps to defend its interests,” and the frontrunner in South Korea’s May 9 presidential election.

Moon Jae-in has called for a delay in the deployment, saying the new administration should make a decision after gathering public opinion and more talks with Washington.

A spokesman for Moon said moving the parts to the site “ignored public opinion and due process” and demanded the deployment be suspended.

Television footage showed military trailers carrying equipment, including what appeared to be launch canisters, to the battery site.

More than 10 protesters were injured in clashes with police, Kim Jong-kyung, a leader of villagers opposing the deployment, told Reuters. Kim said about 200 protesters who rallied overnight would keep up their opposition.

Beijing says the system’s advanced radar can penetrate deep into its territory and undermine its security, but Harris scoffed and suggested Beijing should focus on trying to influence North Korea.

In another move likely to irk China, Harris said he thought there would soon be more U.S. freedom of navigation operation in the South China Sea.

China claims almost the entire South China Sea, where about $5 trillion worth of sea-borne goods pass every year, and has angrily protested previous U.S. operations there.

Harris sought to separate the issue from North Korea.

“We should encourage China and be appreciative of what they are doing with regards to North Korea and we should also be willing to criticize them for their aggressiveness and coerciveness in the South China Sea,” he said.

North Korea’s foreign ministry called U.S. attempts to make Pyongyang give up its nuclear weapons through military threats and sanctions “a wild dream” and like “sweeping the sea with a broom”.

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi urged all sides to ease tensions and work toward a peaceful solution through negotiations.

“Security and stability is quite fragile and there is a great danger that a new conflict, or incidents could happen at any time,” he said.

U.S. officials say Washington sees no value in returning to international talks on North Korea until Pyongyang shows it is serious about denuclearization.

(Additional reporting by Ben Blanchard in Beijing and Phil Stewart, David Brunnstrom and Patricia Zengerle in Washington; Editing by Clive McKeef and James Dalgleish)

Federal judge in Hawaii extends court order blocking Trump travel ban

Hawaii Attorney General Douglas Chin (R) arrives at the U.S. District Court Ninth Circuit to seek an extension after filing an amended lawsuit against President Donald Trump's new travel ban in Honolulu. REUTERS/Hugh Gentry

HONOLULU (Reuters) – A federal judge in Hawaii indefinitely extended on Wednesday an order blocking enforcement of President Donald Trump’s revised ban on travel to the United States from six predominantly Muslim countries.

U.S. District Judge Derrick Watson turned an earlier temporary restraining order into a preliminary injunction in a lawsuit brought by the state of Hawaii challenging Trump’s travel directive as unconstitutional religious discrimination.

Trump signed the new ban on March 6 in a bid to overcome legal problems with a January executive order that caused chaos at airports and sparked mass protests before a Washington judge stopped its enforcement in February. Trump has said the travel ban is needed for national security.

In its challenge to the travel ban, Hawaii claims its state universities would be harmed by the order because they would have trouble recruiting students and faculty.

It also says the island state’s economy would be hit by a decline in tourism. The court papers cite reports that travel to the United States “took a nosedive” after Trump’s actions.

The state was joined by a new plaintiff named Ismail Elshikh, an American citizen from Egypt who is an imam at the Muslim Association of Hawaii and whose mother-in-law lives in Syria, according to the lawsuit.

Hawaii and other opponents of the ban claim that the motivation behind it is based on religion and Trump’s election campaign promise of “a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States.”

“The court will not crawl into a corner, pull the shutters closed, and pretend it has not seen what it has,” Watson wrote on Wednesday.

Watson wrote that his decision to grant the preliminary injunction was based on the likelihood that the state would succeed in proving that the travel ban violated the U.S. Constitution’s religious freedom protection.

Trump has vowed to take the case to the U.S. Supreme Court, which is currently split 4-4 between liberals and conservatives with the president’s pick – appeals court judge Neil Gorsuch – still awaiting confirmation.

(Reporting by Hunter Haskins in Honolulu; Additional reporting and writing by Brendan O’Brien in Milwaukee; Editing by Paul Tait)

U.S. appeals to higher court over ruling against Trump’s revised travel ban

Demonstrators rally against the Trump administration's new ban against travelers from six Muslim-majority nations, outside of the White House. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

By Mica Rosenberg

NEW YORK (Reuters) – The U.S. government took the legal battle over President Donald Trump’s travel ban to a higher court on Friday, saying it would appeal against a federal judge’s decision that struck down parts of the ban on the day it was set to go into effect.

The Department of Justice said in a court filing it would appeal against a ruling by U.S. District Judge Theodore Chuang in Maryland to the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Virginia.

On Thursday, Chuang issued an emergency halt to the portion of Trump’s March 6 executive order temporarily banning the entry of travelers from six Muslim-majority countries. He left in place the section of the order that barred the entry of refugees to the United States for four months.

Another federal judge in Hawaii struck down both sections of the ban in a broader court ruling that prevented Trump’s order from moving forward.

In Washington state, where the ban is also being challenged, U.S. District Court Judge James Robart put a stay on proceedings for as long as the Hawaii court’s nationwide temporary restraining order remained in place, to “conserve resources” and avoid inconsistent and duplicate rulings.

The decisions came in response to lawsuits brought by states’ attorneys general in Hawaii and refugee resettlement agencies in Maryland who were represented by the American Civil Liberties Union and the National Immigration Law Center.

Detractors argue the ban discriminated against Muslims in violation of the U.S. Constitution’s guarantee of religious freedom. Trump says the measure is necessary for national security to protect the country from terrorist attacks.

White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer told a media briefing the government would “vigorously defend this executive order” and appeal against the “flawed rulings.”

The Department of Justice filed a motion late on Friday night seeking clarification of Hawaii’s ruling before appealing to the 9th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals in San Francisco.

The 9th Circuit court last month upheld a decision by Judge Robart that halted an original, more sweeping travel ban signed by the President on Jan. 27 in response to a lawsuit filed by Washington state.

The new executive order was reissued with the intention of overcoming the legal concerns.

Trump has vowed to take the fight all the way to U.S. Supreme Court.

The 4th Circuit is known as a more conservative court compared to the 9th Circuit, said Buzz Frahn, an attorney at Simpson Thacher & Bartlett who has been tracking the litigation nationwide.

“The government is probably thinking that the 4th Circuit … would lend a friendlier ear to its arguments,” he said.

Judges have said they were willing to look behind the text of the order, which does not mention Islam, to probe the motivation for enacting the ban, Frahn said. Trump promised during the election campaign to ban Muslims from entering the United States.

The U.S. Supreme Court is currently split 4-4 between liberals and conservatives, with Trump’s pick for the high court – appeals court judge Neil Gorsuch – still awaiting confirmation.

Hans von Spakovsky, from the Washington D.C.-based Heritage Foundation, said the Department of Justice might want to time their appeals to reach the Supreme Court after Gorsuch is confirmed. He said the court would be likely to hear the case.

“They will take it because of its national importance,” Spakovsky said.

(Reporting by Mica Rosenberg in New York; Additional reporting by Kristina Cooke in San Francisco; Editing by Sue Horton, Mary Milliken and Paul Tait)

Trump vows to appeal against travel ban ruling to Supreme Court

U.S. President Donald Trump delivers remarks at the American Center for Mobility for American Manufactured Vehicles in Ypsilanti Township, Michigan, U.S. March 15, 2017. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

By Dan Levine and Mica Rosenberg

HONOLULU/NEW YORK (Reuters) – A defiant Donald Trump has pledged to appeal against a federal judge’s order placing an immediate halt on his revised travel ban, describing the ruling as judicial overreach that made the United States look weak.

In granting the temporary restraining order in response to a lawsuit by the state of Hawaii, U.S. District Judge Derrick Watson found on Wednesday that “a reasonable, objective observer … would conclude that the executive order was issued with a purpose to disfavor a particular religion.”

Early on Thursday, U.S. District Judge Theodore Chuang issued a nationwide preliminary injunction in a similar case in Maryland brought by refugee resettlement agencies represented by the American Civil Liberties Union and the National Immigration Law Center.

Chuang ruled that the agencies were likely to succeed in proving that the travel ban portion of the executive order was intended to be a ban on Muslims and, as a result, violates the U.S. Constitution’s religious freedom protection.

“To avoid sowing seeds of division in our nation, upholding this fundamental constitutional principle at the core of our nation’s identity plainly serves a significant public interest,” Chuang wrote in his ruling.

The actions were the latest legal blow to the administration’s efforts to temporarily ban refugees as well as travelers from six predominantly Muslim countries. The president has said the ban is needed for national security.

However, the orders, while a victory for the plaintiffs, are only a first step and the government could ultimately win its underlying case. Watson and Chuang were appointed to the bench by former Democratic President Barack Obama.

Trump, speaking after the Hawaii ruling at a rally in Nashville, called his revised executive order a “watered-down version” of his first.

The president said he would take the case “as far as it needs to go,” including to the Supreme Court, in order to get a ruling that the ban is legal.

The likely next stop if the administration decides to contest the Hawaii judge’s ruling would be the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.

Three judges on the Ninth Circuit upheld a restraining order on the first travel ban issued by a Washington state judge.

At that point, the government’s legal options were to ask for a hearing by a larger panel of judges or petition the Supreme Court to hear the case. Instead, the administration withdrew the ban, promising to retool it in ways that would address the legal issues.

If the Ninth Circuit were to uphold the Hawaii court’s ruling, an appeal to the Supreme Court would be complicated by its current makeup of four conservative and four liberal judges, with no ninth justice since the death of Antonin Scalia more than a year ago.

The travel ban has deeply divided the country on liberal and conservative lines, and it is unlikely that a ninth Supreme Court justice would be seated in time to hear an appeal in this case.

Trump signed the new ban on March 6 in a bid to overcome legal problems with his January executive order, which caused chaos at airports and sparked mass protests before a Washington judge stopped its enforcement in February.

Watson’s order is only temporary until the broader arguments in the case can be heard. He set an expedited hearing schedule to determine if his ruling should be extended.

Trump’s first travel order was more sweeping than the second revised order. Like the current one, it barred citizens of Iran, Libya, Syria, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen from entering the United States for 90 days, but it also included Iraq, which was subsequently taken off the list.

The revised ban also excluded legal permanent residents and existing visa holders and provided waivers for various categories of immigrants with ties to the United States.

Hawaii and other opponents of the ban claimed that the motivation behind it was Trump’s campaign promise of “a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States.”

In Washington state, a group of plaintiffs applying for immigrant visas asked U.S. District Judge James Robart in Seattle – who suspended the first ban – to stop the new order. Robart was appointed to the bench by Republican former President George W. Bush.

Judge Robart said he would issue a written ruling, but did not specify a time line.

(Reporting by Dan Levine in Honolulu, Mica Rosenberg in New York and Brendan O’Brien in Milwaukee; Writing by Dan Whitcomb in Los Angeles; Editing by Toby Chopra)

Blizzard dumps snow on Hawaii, California set for record winter rain

By Dan Whitcomb

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – As California edged toward historic rainfall totals in one of the wettest winters in memory, its neighbor state across the Pacific Ocean, Hawaii, has been hit with sustained blizzard conditions that have dumped 8 inches of snow onto mountain peaks.

Snow is not unheard of for the higher mountains of Hawaii, which reach above 10,000 feet (3,000 meters) in elevation, but weather experts say this week’s storm was particularly strong and lingered over the state, delivering a heavier than usual punch.

“The reason for the snow amounts being heavier than we usually see is that the upper low (pressure system) really persisted down there, that has allowed colder air to remain locked in place,” said Andrew Orrison of the National Weather Service’s Weather Prediction Center.

But the blizzard conditions in a state normally thought of as a tropical paradise have made national headlines, accompanied by pictures of snow-capped Hawaiian mountain peaks.

In California, meanwhile, heavy rains have swollen rivers and reservoirs and blanketed the Sierra Nevada mountains with twice as much snow as usual this winter, helping power the state out of five years of severe drought.Orrison said with winter not yet over the state was already among the top two to three seasons on record for snow and rainfall in Northern California.

“Right now we’re looking at potentially an all-time record for rainfall and you have to go back to the winter of 1982-83 for snow pack being as deep as it is.”

He said that while there was still some “lingering concern” for Southern California, which has not had as much snow and rain, the northern and central part of the state were no longer considered to be in a drought.

“It’s a very good story to have and there has just been substantial improvement, even in Southern California,” Orrison said.

On Thursday, the National Drought Mitigation Center said that less than 10 percent of the state remained in drought – the lowest amount since 2011.

By comparison, on the same day last year more than 95 percent of the state was in the throes of an unprecedented, five-year drought that led farmers to fallow fields and cost billions to the economy.

Forecasters said it was too early to predict what could be in store next winter, although there were some preliminary indications of a so-called El Nino climate pattern that warms the ocean and typically brings more rain and snow to California.

(Reporting by Dan Whitcomb in Los Angeles; Additional reporting by Sharon Bernstein in Sacramento; Editing by David Gregorio)

Hundreds of North American bee species face extinction: study

The western bumble bee, Bombus occidentalis, is seen in this undated U.S. Department of Agriculture photo. REUTERS/Stephen Ausmus/USDA/Handout via Reuters

By Gina Cherelus

(Reuters) – More than 700 of the 4,000 native bee species in North America and Hawaii are believed to be inching toward extinction due to increased pesticide use leading to habitat loss, a scientific study showed on Wednesday.

The Center for Biological Diversity’s report concluded that of the 1,437 native bee species for which there was sufficient data to evaluate, about 749 of them were declining. Some 347 of the species, which play a vital role in plant pollination, are imperiled and at risk of extinction, the study found.

“It’s a quiet but staggering crisis unfolding right under our noses that illuminates the unacceptably high cost of our careless addiction to pesticides and monoculture farming,” its author, Kelsey Kopec, said in a statement.

Habitat loss, along with heavy pesticide use, climate change and increasing urbanization are the main causes for declining bee populations, the study found.

Experts from the center reviewed the status of 316 bee species and then conducted reviews of all available information to determine the status of a further 1,121 species. The center said the species which lacked sufficient data were also presumed to be at risk of extinction.

Among the native species that are severely threatened are the Gulf Coast solitary bee, the macropis cuckoo bee and the sunflower leafcutting bee, which is now rarely seen.

Last month, the rusty patched bumble bee was listed by federal authorities as endangered, becoming the first wild bee in the continental United States to gain such protection.

Bees provide valuable services: the pollination furnished by various insects in the United States, mostly by bees, has been valued at an estimated $3 billion each year.

The center’s Kopec noted that almost 90 percent of wild plants are dependent on insect pollination.

“If we don’t act to save these remarkable creatures, our world will be a less colorful and more lonesome place,” she said.

(Reporting by Gina Cherelus; Editing by Daniel Wallis and Andrew Hay)

U.S. deploys high-tech radar amid heightened North Korea rhetoric: official

radar to spy on North Korea

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A high-tech sea-based U.S. military radar has left Hawaii to monitor for potential North Korean intercontinental ballistic missile test launches, a U.S. defense official said on Wednesday.

Earlier this month, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un said that the isolated, nuclear-capable country was close to test-launching an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM).

The official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the radar, known as the Sea-based X-band radar (SBX), left on Monday and would reach its destination, about 2,000 miles (3,218 km) northwest of Hawaii, towards the end of January.

The radar is able to track ICBMs and differentiate between hostile missiles and those that are not a threat.

On Tuesday, U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter said the U.S. military might monitor a North Korean intercontinental ballistic missile test and gather intelligence rather than destroy it, as long as the launch did not pose a threat.

“If the missile is threatening, it will be intercepted. If it’s not threatening, we won’t necessarily do so,” Carter said,

“Because it may be more to our advantage to, first of all, save our interceptor inventory, and, second, to gather intelligence from the flight, rather than do that (intercept the ICBM) when it’s not threatening.”

Carter’s remarks came just over a week after U.S. President-elect Donald Trump vowed that North Korea would never fulfill its threat to test an ICBM. Trump said in a Jan. 2 tweet: “It won’t happen!”

“The SBX’s current deployment is not based on any credible threat; however, we cannot discuss specifics for this particular mission while it is underway,” Commander Gary Ross, a Pentagon spokesman, said.

(Reporting by Idrees Ali and Phil Stewart; Editing by James Dalgleish)

Powerful storms head for U.S. West after thousands flee floods

Partially submerged building in California

(Reuters) – Powerful storms packing heavy rain and snow will lash the U.S. West on Tuesday, a day after thousands of people fled their homes to escape floods, forecasters said.

A band of heavy downpours will drench northern California and heavy snow will fall in the Sierra Nevada mountains into Wednesday, exacerbating the threat of flooding, the National Weather Service said.

The storms are part of weather system called the “Pineapple Express” that has soaked a vast area from Hawaii to the typically drought-prone states of California and Nevada.

Just north of San Francisco, the Russian River in Sonoma County flooded early on Monday, forcing the evacuation of more than 3,000 residents, officials said.

In Nevada, residents of about 400 homes in Reno were ordered to leave as rains swelled the Truckee River, which flows through the city, a county official said.

A woman died after she was struck by a falling tree in the San Francisco area, local officials and media reported.

Over the weekend, an ancient giant sequoia tree with a hollowed-out tunnel was toppled by floods in Calaveras Big Trees State Park just southeast of Sacramento.

California’s Napa Valley vinyards largely escaped undamaged and the rain was expected to replenish water supplies after five years of drought, said Patsy McGaughy, Napa Valley Vintners spokeswoman.

California officially remains in a state of drought as water is still scarce in the south.

But northern California’s Lake Oroville, the principal reservoir for the State Water Project, has 2.25 million acre feet of water, more than double the amount it had a year ago, Michael Anderson, state climatologist for the California Department of Water Resources, said.

(Reporting by Brendan O’Brien in Milwaukee)

Japan’s Abe pays respects at Hawaii memorials on eve of Pearl Harbor trip

Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe presents a wreath at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific at Punchbowl in Honolulu, Hawaii, U.S.

By Emily Stephenson

HONOLULU (Reuters) – Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Monday stopped at several memorials in Hawaii, one day before he visits the site of the 1941 bombing of Pearl Harbor during a trip intended to show a strong alliance between his country and the United States.

Abe made no public remarks and stood in silence before a wreath of flowers at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific, a memorial to those who died while serving in the U.S. Armed Forces.

Abe, joined by two of his Cabinet members, bowed his head before wreaths of white flowers and greenery laid at the feet of stone monuments at Makiki Cemetery in Honolulu dedicated to Japanese who settled in Hawaii in the 1800s.

The crowning event of the trip comes Tuesday, when Abe and U.S. President Barack Obama will visit Pearl Harbor, the site of the Japanese attack 75 years ago that drew the United States into World War Two. Obama, who was born in Hawaii, is spending his winter vacation there.

Abe does not plan to apologize for the 1941 attack but to console the souls of those who died in the war, his aides said this month.

Japan hopes to present a strong alliance with the United States amid concerns about China’s expanding military capability. Japan was monitoring a group of Chinese warships that entered the top half of the South China Sea earlier on Monday.

“I am very much looking forward to sending out a strong message on the value of reconciliation, as well as our sincere prayer for the souls of the war dead,” Abe, speaking through an interpreter, said at the Hawaii Convention Center in Honolulu.

Abe has called U.S.-Japan relations an “alliance of hope” and said the devastation of war should not be repeated.

In China, where the government has repeatedly urged Japan to show greater repentance for World War Two and Japan’s invasion of China, Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said it was “wishful thinking” for Abe if he hoped to use the visit to “settle the accounts” for the war.

“No matter the posture, no matter what show is put on, only sincere reflection can realize the key to reconciliation,” Hua told reporters.

Japanese leaders hope to send a message of unity as well to President-elect Donald Trump, who triggered concerns before his Nov. 8 election by opposing the U.S.-led Trans-Pacific Partnership trade pact and threatening to force allied countries to pay more to host U.S. forces.

Abe has tightened ties with Washington during his four years in office, stretching the limits of Japan’s pacifist constitution and boosting defense spending.

Amid wind and rain on Monday, Abe presented a wreath at the armed forces memorial located at Honolulu’s Punchbowl Crater. After a moment of silence, he signed a guestbook and then stopped at the grave of former U.S. Senator Daniel Inouye, who fought in World War II in Europe and whose parents were Japanese. He died in 2012.

Abe’s visit will come seven months after Obama became the first serving U.S. president to visit the Japanese city of Hiroshima, where the United States dropped an atomic bomb in the closing days of the war in 1945.

At least three Japanese premiers have visited Pearl Harbor, but the Japanese government says Abe will be the first to pray for the dead with a U.S. president at the memorial built over the remains of the sunken battleship USS Arizona.

(Reporting by Emily Stephenson, additional reporting by Hugh Gentry, and by Linda Sieg in Tokyo and Ben Blanchard in Beijing; Editing by Lisa Shumaker and Nick Macfie)

Hurricane warning issued for parts of Florida; Madeline weakens

A city worker fills sandbags to help residents prepare for an expected tropical storm in Gulfport, Florida

TAMPA BAY, Fla. (Reuters) – Forecasters and public officials urged Floridians to prepare for potentially catastrophic flooding and damaging winds as Tropical Storm Hermine was expected to become a hurricane by the time it reached Florida’s northern Gulf Coast on Thursday.

A hurricane warning was in effect for the Florida panhandle from the Suwannee River to Mexico Beach as the strengthening storm was expected to sweep across northern parts of the state and then northeast along the Atlantic Coast, the National Hurricane Center said in an advisory.

The forecast of rough weather prompted Florida Governor Rick Scott to declare an emergency on Wednesday as many school districts along the Gulf Coast canceled after-school activities and ordered students to stay home on Thursday.

Cities such as Tallahassee and Orlando were offering sandbags to residents to protect homes and businesses from flooding caused by the up to 10 inches (25 cm) of rain as heavy rains were already pounding parts of the state and were expected through Friday.

“There is a danger of life-threatening inundation,” said the center’s advisory that noted the possibility of as much as 20 inches (20 cm) of rain to fall in some isolated areas and life-threatening flash flooding.

The storm, packing winds of 60 mph (95 kmh) with higher gusts, was expected to get stronger by the time it reach landfall, making outside preparations difficult or dangerous, the center said.

“Heavy rainfall and strong winds will make driving dangerous. Even after the storm passes, citizens should avoid unnecessary travel to allow first responders and road clearing crews to quickly respond to emergency needs,” the City of Tallahassee said in an alert to residents.

Three storm systems are shown (L TO R) Tropical Depression Nine to the southeast of Florida, Tropical Depression Eight just off the coast of the Carolinas and Hurricane Gaston in the central Atlantic Ocean are shown in this GOES East satellite image captured August 29, 2016. NOAA/handout via REUTERS

Three storm systems are shown (L TO R) Tropical Depression Nine to the southeast of Florida, Tropical Depression Eight just off the coast of the Carolinas and Hurricane Gaston in the central Atlantic Ocean are shown in this GOES East satellite image captured August 29, 2016. NOAA/handout via REUTERS

On its current path, the system would also dump as much as 10 inches (25 cm) of rain on coastal areas of Georgia, which was under a tropical storm watch, and the Carolinas.

A tropical storm warning was also issued for the U.S. east coast from Marineland, Florida to South Santee River, South Carolina, the Miami-based weather forecaster said.

U.S. oil and gas producers in the east of the Gulf of Mexico removed workers from 10 offshore platforms, moved drilling rigs and shut some output because of the storm.

The hurricane center also said in an advisory that the center of Hurricane Gaston will move near the Azores on Friday.

Meantime, Hurricane Madeline weakened to a tropical storm as it passed south of Hawaii’s Big Island, where officials opened shelters and closed offices, schools and roads on Wednesday.

The tropical storm, before it moves westward out of reach of Hawaii, was expected to dump as much as 15 inches (40 cm) of rain on parts of the Big Island, according to the National Weather Service.

Hurricane Lester, currently a major Category 4 storm, could affect Hawaii over the weekend.

Hawaii Governor David Ige signed an emergency proclamation that runs through Sept. 9, freeing up state resources.

(Reporting by Brendan O’Brien in Milwaukee; Editing by Toby Chopra)