As Hurricane Florence hits South Carolina, government officials and environmental groups are watching a string of contaminated sites that threaten to leak harmful pollutants if heavy rains continue through the weekend. The biggest worry is that rain will swell rivers so high that they will flood waste sites or that rain will wash toxins off contaminated land into rivers or lakes. Sites being watched include a hazardous waste dump near Lake Marion, hog lagoons in…

Four deaths have been confirmed as a result of Hurricane Florence, now a tropical storm.A mother and infant were killed after a tree fell on their Wilmington home as Hurricane Florence made landfall in the Carolinas. The father was transported to a hospital for treatment, the Associated Press reported. A third death happened in Kinston, Lenoir County officials said, when a 78-year-old man was electrocuted at a home Friday morning when he attempted to connect…

With one grueling day behind them, the Carolinas on Friday grappled with rising water and cascading misery from a deadly and agonizingly slow-moving Tropical Storm Florence expected to linger through the weekend. In Myrtle Beach, rescuers discovered a dead mother and her baby, two of at least five deaths blamed on the storm, after spending much of the day trying to cut through debris and a towering tree that crashed through their roof. The Cajun…

More than half a million customers are without power in North Carolina as Tropical Storm Florence brings heavy, life-threatening floods to the coast.As of 6:15 p.m., Friday, 726,500 people were without power. VIEW THE OUTAGE MAP BELOW. More outage information here Most of the outages are in Beaufort, Bladen, Brunswick, Carteret, Columbus Craven, Duplin, New Hanover, Robeson, Sampson, Wake, Wayne, Pamlico, Pender and Onslow counties near the coast. RELATED: What to do if you lose…

Hurricane Florence is pummeling the Carolinas with strong winds, heavy rain and dangerous tidal surges, destroying buildings and lives. The Red Cross is providing safe shelter and comfort for evacuees across six states. More than 20,000 people sought refuge in more than 200 Red Cross and community shelters Thursday night to escape the storm’s wrath. HOW YOU CAN HELP Red Cross:The Red Cross depends on financial donations to provide disaster relief. You can help people…

As Hurricane Florence continues to move inland through South Carolina, most of the state has been placed under a flash flood watch by the National Weather Service. There are specific areas in S.C. that have been issued flood warnings, but there is a difference between that and flash flooding. “Flooding is an overflowing of water onto land that is normally dry,” according to the National Severe Storms Laboratory. A flash flood is “the most dangerous…