Source:
Associated Press(08-23) 15:52 PDT , (AP) --
APALACHICOLA, Fla. — Fay just won't quit.
The tropical storm that set a record with four landfalls in Florida chugged west across the Gulf Coast on Saturday and cities from Pensacola to New Orleans prepared for several inches of rain.
Proving that a slow-moving tropical storm can be as deadly and damaging as a hurricane, Fay killed at least 11 people in Florida and one in Georgia, emergency officials said.
Thousands of homes and businesses were inundated with flood waters this week as the storm worked its way north from its first landfall in the Florida Keys and zigzagged across the peninsula.
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In the New Orleans area, which is approaching the third anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, forecasts called for 1 to 3 inches of rain on the south shore of Lake Pontchartrain. In St. Bernard Parish, site of some of the worst post-Katrina flooding, emergency officials were handing out sandbags Saturday.
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Fay has been an unusual storm since it was named Aug. 15. After hitting the Keys Monday, it crossed open water again before hitting a second time near Naples on the southwest coast. It limped across the state, popped back out into the Atlantic Ocean and struck again near Flagler Beach on the central eastern coast. It was the first storm in almost 50 years to make three landfalls in the state as a tropical storm. Its fourth landfall as such was the first in recorded history.
"This is unprecedented in terms of the slow nature of this storm, the large circulation and the fact that it's impacted probably about 90 percent of the state with heavy rains and severe weather," state meteorologist Ben Nelson said.
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