800,000 in Charley's Path Told to Flee

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Nearly a million residents and tourists were told Thursday to get out of the way of a rapidly strengthening Hurricane Charley, while its weaker sister, Tropical Storm Bonnie, blustered ashore in the Florida Panhandle.

Charley, which had pumped up to nearly 105 mph by early afternoon, was expected to hit the state's west coast Friday, possibly bringing heavy rain, swirling tornadoes and a storm surge of up to 12 feet to the Tampa Bay and Fort Myers areas.

The back-to-back storms - the first to menace the state so close together since 1906 - prompted Gov. Jeb Bush to declare a state of emergency for all of Florida.

There were no reports of heavy rains or flooding in already-soaked areas of the Panhandle after Bonnie's disorganized center blustered ashore with wind near 50 mph. By midday, Apalachicola looked as if nothing happened. The sun was shining and the surf was calming down.

Charley loomed, however, prompting evacuation requests for 800,000 residents and tourists along coastal areas from the Florida Keys to Tampa Bay. The evacuations included flood-prone sections of the Tampa-St. Petersburg area. All residents of MacDill Air Force Base on Tampa Bay have been ordered to evacuate, and only essential personnel will remain, spokeswoman Lt. Erin Dorrance said. MacDill is home to U.S. Central Command, the nerve center of the war in Iraq, and the Special Operations Command.

This is Florida's biggest evacuation request since 1999, when Hurricane Floyd brushed the state's east coast and prompted officials to urge a record 1.3 million to evacuate.

Charley, which became a hurricane Wednesday before spinning by Jamaica, was heading past the Cayman Islands on Thursday and was expected to travel over western Cuba on its track toward Florida.

Hurricane watches or warnings were extended to include most of Florida's Gulf Coast, and Charley was predicted to strike the Keys and the Florida Gulf Coast early Friday.

In the Keys, tourists had been told to leave Wednesday, and the order was expanded Thursday to include a mandatory evacuation of mobile homes in the lower Keys.

The lone road to the mainland, the Overseas Highway, was blocked by an accident for more than an hour Thursday morning, slowing the evacuation.

Al Perkins, 55, a small business owner in the Keys, placed office computers and a photocopier in garbage bags while outside a colleague hammered metal hurricane shutters on top of windows

"If it gets over a 150 miles per hour winds, I'm out of here. Anything less than that, I've already been in, so it's not a problem," he said.

Residents along Florida's southwestern coast were preparing for havoc, boarding up homes with plywood and buying supplies such as water, canned food and batteries.

Sarasota resident Beth Ciombor was at a Home Depot loading two sheets of plywood onto her minivan's roof while her 2-year-old son watched.

"I'm on the verge of tears. It's so frightening," Ciombor said.

Back-to-back storms haven't struck so close together in Florida since Oct. 17, 1906, when two tropical storms hit the state, said Ken Reeves, the senior meteorologist at AccuWeather, a commercial forecasting center.

As Bonnie moved northward over land, forecasters issued flash flood and tornado watches ahead of it for parts of Georgia and the Carolinas. And they said Charley, coming through a day later, could pose a bigger threat, with the ground already soaked and trees' root systems weakened by Bonnie.

For North Carolina, the heavy rain from the storms was coming just a week after Hurricane Alex damaged parts of that state's Outer Banks.

At 2 p.m. EDT, Bonnie was centered about 30 miles southeast of Tallahassee, moving at 28 mph. Charley was about 190 miles south of Havana, traveling at 17 mph.

In Key West, the electronic sign at the Waffle House scrolled a message to the storm, "Stay Away Charley." Plywood and metal storm shutters graced only a few homes and businesses and most streets were quiet.

In Islamorada, in the northern Keys, Lou Anne Settle and Jordan Davis shrugged off the hurricane, sipping wine and gazing at the sunset along the marina where they live in a houseboat. They had no plans to leave.

"It's a little early to be worried," Davis said, before raising her glass and toasting, "to the hurricane - to Charley."

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Associated Press writers Ken Thomas in Key West and David Royse in Apalachicola contributed to this report.