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Theater listings: Sept. 8 to 14

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SCI Retreat is locked down for required search

<p>MIAMI &#8212; As Caribbean islands pummeled by Hurricane Irma began to grapple with the monster storm&#8217;s toll Thursday, nervous residents of South Florida packed highways seeking safer ground amid forecasts warning that Irma posed an increasing threat to the highly populated area.</p><p>The National Hurricane Center on Thursday issued a hurricane watch for the southernmost part of Florida, the first such alert Irma has prompted in the mainland United States. A storm-surge watch, which warned of potentially life-threatening levels of water, also was issued for the southern part of the state, an area that includes the Florida Keys, which a day earlier began evacuations.</p><p>Irma&#8217;s Category 5 force pinwheeled through the Caribbean, leaving a wake of leveled neighborhoods, ravaged seafronts and at least 10 deaths, according to government officials and news reports. The storm is grinding toward the Bahamas with winds of 180 mph and higher gusts registered, according to the hurricane center, which warned of storm surges capable of swallowing huge sections of the coast.</p><p>After the Bahamas, Irma&#8217;s expected path takes aim at Florida, including the ribbon of cities, dense suburbs and swampland that are home to more than 6 million people from Palm Beach to Miami-Dade counties. The Hurricane Center projects Irma will hit the Miami area at 8 a.m. Sunday, and the coastal area near Orlando at 8 a.m. Monday.</p><p>&#8220;Look at the size of this storm,&#8221; said Florida Gov. Rick Scott. &#8220;It&#8217;s powerful and deadly.&#8221; He said evacuations might stretch &#8220;coast to coast&#8221; from the Atlantic to the Gulf of Mexico. With potentially millions of people hitting the road to escape, Scott said emergency efforts are underway to keep fuel shipments moving to gas stations.</p><p>Increasing evacuations were getting underway across South Florida. On Thursday morning, Miami-Dade County, the state&#8217;s most populous, began evacuating people along the coast. Broward County Mayor Barbara Sharief said evacuations would begin there at midday along the eastern stretch of the county.</p><p>By Thursday morning, as Irma&#8217;s eye was moving north off the island of Hispaniola, aid workers in Haiti &#8212; a vulnerable nation already devastated by a major earthquake in 2010 and Hurricane Matthew in 2016 &#8212; were preparing for another potential disaster.</p><p>Concern centered on Haiti&#8217;s flood-prone north, which was expected to be hardest hit. Haiti raised its hurricane alert level to red, its highest, and the north coast remained under a hurricane watch as the central coast faced the threat of tropical storm winds and rain.</p><p>Officials across Florida responded to the dire forecasts by slowly shutting down the contours of daily life. Schools closed; the NFL postponed the Miami Dolphins&#8217; season opener scheduled for Sunday; the University of Central Florida in Orlando, which could face punishing weather if Irma crawls up the coastline, moved a football game to Friday night; and the University of Miami announced the cancellation of its football game Saturday in Arkansas so the team doesn&#8217;t have to travel.</p><p>People across Florida who planned to ride out the storm were clearing store shelves of water, food and supplies, and people trying to drive north had to search for gas &#8212; and hotel rooms. Many streamed to South Florida&#8217;s airports.</p><style>
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<div class="neFile"><img class="neImage" src="https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/web1_irma-2.jpg">
<div class="neCaption">Residents wait in line outside of a Home Depot store ahead of Hurricane Irma in Miami on Wednesday. (Jayme Gershen | Bloomberg)</div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo0>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/web1_irma-2.jpg</photo0><caption0>Residents wait in line outside of a Home Depot store ahead of Hurricane Irma in Miami on Wednesday. (Jayme Gershen | Bloomberg)</caption0><photoCredit0></photoCredit0></div></div>
<div class="metaInfo"><bylineMeta><p>Washington Post</p></bylineMeta></div>

Florida nervously tracks Hurricane Irma; life-threatening water levels possible