Orlando International Airport, the seventh busiest in the U.S., was set to close at 4 p.m. Palm Beach International Airport closed Wednesday morning, and Daytona Beach International Airport said it would cease operations. There is no penalty for ignoring an evacuation order, but rescue crews will not respond if it puts their members at risk.ĭisney World and Universal Orlando Resort announced they were closing early on Wednesday and likely would not reopen as scheduled on Thursday. The resort's security office hung up Wednesday when an Associated Press reporter asked whether the club was being evacuated and there was no sign of evacuation by early afternoon. The main buildings sit on a small rise that is about 15 feet (4.6 meters) above sea level and the property has survived numerous stronger hurricanes since it was built nearly a century ago. Mar-a-Lago, Trump's club and home, is in one of those evacuation zones, built about a quarter-mile inland from the ocean. Volusia, home to Daytona Beach, imposed a curfew and warned that intercoastal bridges used by evacuees would close when winds reach 39 mph. Residents in several Florida counties - Flagler, Palm Beach, Martin and Volusia - were ordered to evacuate such barrier islands, low-lying areas and mobile homes.

The Martin County Sheriff's office also said seawater had breached part of a road on Hutchinson Island. Lucie County Sheriff's Office said in a tweet that storm surge from Tropical Storm Nicole had already breached the sea wall along Indian River Drive, which runs parallel to the Atlantic Ocean. Flooding and power outages were reported in Grand Abaco. In the Bahamas, officials said that more than 520 people were in more than two dozen shelters. Nicole is the first storm to hit the Bahamas since Hurricane Dorian, a Category 5 storm that devastated the archipelago in 2019, before hitting Florida. 'We are forecasting it to become a hurricane as it nears the northwestern Bahamas, and remain a hurricane as it approaches the east coast of Florida,' Daniel Brown, a senior hurricane specialist at the Miami-based National Hurricane Center, said earllier Wednesday. National Hurricane Center said the center of the sprawling storm made landfall on Great Abaco island around midday with estimated maximum sustained winds of 70 mph. Hundreds of people sought shelter in the northwestern Bahamas before the approaching storm, which had already sent seawater washing across roads on barrier islands in Florida. MIAMI (AP) - Tropical Storm Nicole forced people from their homes in the Bahamas and threatened to grow into a rare November hurricane in Florida on Wednesday, shutting down theme parks and airports while prompting evacuation orders that included former President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago club.

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