"The good news on Earl is that it has been steadily weakening, maybe even a little quicker than forecast," Bill Read, director of the National Hurricane Center, said in a telephone news conference. "It may even go below hurricane strength about the time it passes southern New England overnight tonight."
Earl's maximum sustained winds dropped from 105 miles per hour this morning to 80 miles per hour at 2 p.m. -- making it a Category 1 hurricane -- as the storm, still hundreds of miles from Massachusetts, steamed through ever-cooler waters off the mid-Atlantic coast.
National Weather Service forecasters in Taunton predicted this morning that Earl would be a Category 1 hurricane when it churns 50 to 100 miles miles south and east of Nantucket tonight.
The Massachusetts forecasters said Nantucket and outer Cape Cod were the only two areas where a brief period of hurricane-force wind gusts of slightly more than 74 miles per hour were expected.
The rest of the southeastern Massachusetts coastline may see tropical storm wind gusts of 50 to 70 miles per hour.
"The picture is better," said weather service meteorologist Kim Buttrick. "It seems to be it's going to be coming in weaker than we thought yesterday."
Buttrick said the service was continuing to post hurricane warnings because the hurricane could "wobble" to the west and have a greater impact than currently predicted.
"It's a hurricane and it has a life of its own," she said. "We want to err on the side of caution."
State and local officials have been preparing for several days for the storm and this morning the White House announced that President Obama had declared an emergency in the state, ordering federal aid to supplement the state and local efforts.
Governor Deval Patrick said this afternoon at a news conference that the state was continuing to prepare very seriously for the storm. Among other measures taken, he said, the National Guard has been deployed, extra state troopers are on duty, search and rescue and debris clearance teams are in place, and water and other supplies have been pre-positioned. He also said that utilities have placed more than 1,000 repair crews in the area to deal with downed wires.
Response plans have not changed, he said, "because it's Mother Nature and she changes her mind quickly. I think probably the biggest difference is that if it remains a Category 1, the recovery and cleanup will be even faster."
He said it was possible the cleanup would be so swift it could salvage some of the holiday weekend for the Cape and islands merchants.
Peter Judge, a spokesman for the Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency, emphasized that a small turn in the storm could increase the damage.
"A [Category] 1 that turns a little bit to the left is Hurricane Bob, which we saw in 1991 and that was certainly a legitimate worthwhile storm that left tens of millions of dollars worth of damage," he said.
A Category 1 hurricane carries winds of 74 to 95 miles per hour. As recently as Thursday morning, Earl had been a Category 4 storm, with winds of 145 miles per hour. And experts from the National Hurricane Center had predicted the center would pass "very close" to Nantucket, while local National Weather Service forecasters suggested it could pass as close as 15 miles.
While the hurricane may not be as strong and close as was originally predicted, its winds, hitting trees full of foliage, will still be able to down or uproot them, causing scattered power outages, particularly on the Cape and islands, forecasters said. Tropical storm force winds are defined as winds from 39 to 73 miles per hour.
The storm will also bring some areas heavy rains of up to 6 inches over a 6-hour period, raising the possibility of urban and poor drainage flooding, as well as small stream flooding. The storm is not expected to cause serious coastal flooding because it is hitting at a perfect time -- low tide. But it is expected to stir up heavy surf and dangerous rip currents along the coast, beginning today.
Forecasters warned that the dangerous conditions at the beach would persist into Saturday, then begin slowly easing on Sunday and Monday. They advised people to check with local lifeguards about conditions before jumping in.
"If the winds and the rains don't get us, the surf will," said Buttrick.
Judge said the state emergency operations center in Framingham had been fully activated this morning and about 100 federal, state, private, and volunteer personnel would be staffing it around the clock, ready to assist local communities.
"The state and local communities are very prepared. The good thing about hurricanes is it gives you the lead time to take these steps, to pre-position and make sure you have all your ducks in a row. We think we've done that this week," he said.
In Chatham, Harbormaster Stuart Smith said he wasn't ready to let his guard down, despite the news that the storm was predicted to be less fearsome.
"These storms are unpredictable. It's not going to be as bad… but we're still going to get tropical storm force winds and hurricane gusts and that's bad enough people got to pay attention," Smith said from his boat this morning.
He said the storm was comparable to a winter nor'easter, "but we don’t have 20,000 visitors in Chatham and 3,000 recreational boats in the water" when those storms hit.
"When it gets north of us, I'll breathe a sigh of relief," he said.
The state had braced for the storm on Thursday, with Governor Patrick declaring a state of emergency. On Nantucket, crews piled sandbags and mariners pulled boats from the harbor, while on Cape Cod half-inch-thick plywood and flashlight batteries outsold sunscreen. Beaches were closed, renters left cottages early, and day trippers shifted plans inland, the Globe reported this morning.
As of 2 p.m. today, Earl was 290 miles south-southwest of Nantucket, moving north-northeast at 21 miles per hour, after lashing the North Carolina coast
Mass. foreclosures keep climbing
More than 1,200 foreclosures were recorded in Massachusetts in July, an increase of nearly 80 percent from July 2009, said the Warren Group, a Boston company that tracks local real estate activity and publishes Banker & Tradesman.
In a statement, Vincent M. Valvo, group publisher and editor-in-chief of Banker & Tradesman, said: "We've been seeing a trend of declining foreclosure petitions and increasing foreclosure deeds. Home owners are still under duress and the market isn't getting any better. With sales down and unemployment up, we are likely to see increasing foreclosure activity for the next few months."
School districts around the state will receive $204 million in new federal aid in the coming weeks to rehire laid-off teachers and other employees, Governor Deval Patrick announced today.
The money, coming from the Education Jobs Fund approved by Congress earlier this month, is in addition to the $250 million Massachusetts won on Tuesday in the Obama administration's Race to the Top program. The Race to the Top money is intended for school improvement efforts, rather than plugging budget shortfalls.
The new money represents the state's share of the $10 billion Education Job Funds bill, which is expected to fund 160,000 positions nationwide, including 2,700 in Massachusetts. School districts can spend the money this school year or save some for the next school year, which is expected to be yet another tough budget year.
The governor made the announcement at the Normandin Middle School in New Bedford, which is expecting to receive more than $6 million to save jobs, including 82 positions at the Normandin.
"With this significant infusion of funds, we are building a better, stronger future for our kids, our communities and our Commonwealth," Patrick said in a statement following the New Bedford event.
Obama to begin five-state campaign swing next week
Starting Monday, Obama will make stops in Wisconsin, California, Washington state, Ohio and Florida before returning to the White House on Wednesday. In Wisconsin, he will tour ZBB Energy Corp. and make remarks.
In Seattle, Obama will headline campaign events for Sen. Patty Murray of Washington. He'll also discuss the new health care law at a meeting of the National Association of Insurance Commissioners.
After the swing, Obama is scheduled to take his family to Martha's