Hurricane Frances

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. - To most, it's debris. To a few: five delicious syllables. Memorabilia. Around the state, lips are being licked. There is money to be made. And the place to make it? eBay. Which is why, with a few mouse clicks, the hurricane-deprived worldwide can now buy their very own pieces of Florida history. The Internet auction site features Hurricane Frances Rain Water ("You are bidding on one vial of actual rain water from Hurricane Frances! Collect a piece of history from this one-of-a-kind weather event!"

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. - The federal government used hurricane aid money to pay funeral expenses for at least 203 Floridians whose deaths were not caused by last year's storms, the state's coroners said. The deaths include a Palm Beach Gardens millionaire recovering from heart surgery who died two days before Hurricane Frances, a Miami baby not born when the storm arrived, and a Port Charlotte man who died of cirrhosis and heart failure five months after Hurricane Charley. In two other cases, coroners could find no record of the people dying.

NASSAU, Bahamas - Hurricane Frances barreled up the Bahamas yesterday, ravaging island after island with high winds, heavy rains and surging seas as it took aim on Florida. In Nassau, home to two-thirds of the nation's 300,000 inhabitants, 90-mph gusts blew out windows, sheared limbs off trees and ripped power lines from utility poles. White surf smashed boats into seawalls and flooded coastal roads. A Nassau teenager was electrocuted yesterday, the first death here attributed to Frances.

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. - While defending its handling of disaster assistance in Miami-Dade County, the Federal Emergency Management Agency revealed yesterday that it overpaid $12 million in hurricane relief to 3,500 Floridians and is trying to recover the money. The agency blamed the problem on a "computer glitch." Last week a U.S. Senate committee announced an investigation into allegations of fraud and abuse in FEMA payments throughout the country. FEMA officials said they have done a good job responding to the unprecedented four hurricanes that hit Florida last year and have found no fraud in Miami-Dade.

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. - With rolling aluminum oxygen tanks and shiny silver wheelchairs, 500 elderly and infirm residents hobbled into a special-needs emergency shelter at the South Florida Fairgrounds yesterday to seek refuge from colossal Hurricane Frances, which is threatening to smack the coast with record force. The area's most vulnerable residents brought their medicines, pillows and caregivers in an effort to maintain their health and some level of comfort in an enormous exhibit hall crammed with neat rows of folding beds and bright yellow portable bathrooms.

As the second major hurricane in less than a month continued to bear down on Central Florida, residents counted the hours until landfall with a tumult of activities and emotions. "My mood? My mood is cautious," said William M. Vail Jr., 45, manager of Woodlawn Funeral Home in Gotha, where cemetery machinery was moved inside, debris from the last hurricane swept up, and business suspended. This freed Vail to head home for the evening, make popcorn and watch the movie Jersey Girl with his wife, Jillian, and two cats.

As if the winds weren't enough bad news, hydrologists told anxious Floridians yesterday that water - pumped by Hurricane Frances from the ocean and the sky - could pose an even more serious threat to their lives and property. A storm surge of up to 12 feet during two high-tide cycles this weekend could submerge up to a third of the barrier dunes north of storm's center and batter beachfront homes, they said. Worse, as much as 18 inches of rain is forecast for Central Florida over at least two days - adding more woes to a state already soggy from two to three times its normal rainfall in August.

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. -- The neon "OPEN" sign peeking out of a boarded-up strip mall at 7 a.m. yesterday was not a mistake. Sheriff's deputies who came by to check on the restaurant pub figured it might be the only business still open in the entire county. "We're going to ride out the storm here," said Becky Young, owner of the Player's Choice Pub & Grill. "We told our customers and friends, if you need a place to go, we'll be here." Young, 39, set up a futon mattress with sheets and pillows in the corner of the pub in case she needs a nap over the next day or two as Hurricane Frances hovers over the coast, lashing the area with high winds and driving rain.

ORLANDO, Fla. - Some sat next to sandbags along the outside wall of the school, having a last smoke before the rain forced them inside. Others wrapped themselves in well-worn blankets and lay on blue wrestling mats on the hard cafeteria floor. Tourists from Vancouver laughed and shared tuna sandwiches with Disney workers who live a few miles away. Everyone at Odyssey Middle School seemed to agree yesterday that Hurricane Frances should hurry up and come so that they wouldn't have to pass more idle hours.

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. - To most, it's debris. To a few: five delicious syllables. Memorabilia. Around the state, lips are being licked. There is money to be made. And the place to make it? eBay. Which is why, with a few mouse clicks, the hurricane-deprived worldwide can now buy their very own pieces of Florida history. The Internet auction site features Hurricane Frances Rain Water ("You are bidding on one vial of actual rain water from Hurricane Frances! Collect a piece of history from this one-of-a-kind weather event!"

LAKE WORTH, Fla. -- Rain-weary residents dried out, cleaned up and surveyed the damage caused by Hurricane Frances' wide reach as the weakened storm took a second hit at the state yesterday, dumping more water and wind over the Florida panhandle before finally moving inland. The lumbering storm, which battered Florida for much of the holiday weekend, knocked out power to as many as 6 million people and was blamed for at least four deaths. It ripped off roofs, destroyed luxury yachts, caused heavy damage at the Kennedy Space Center and left waterlogged suburban parking lots looking more like the Everglades than strip malls.

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. -- David Soloweszyk had been a Baltimore guy his entire life. He grew up on Eager Street, later moved to Pimlico, and most recently lived in Randallstown. Eight weeks ago, he and his wife, Tobie, 52, moved to Boynton Beach in Palm Beach County because Tobie said she couldn't stand another Baltimore snowstorm. But the Soloweszyks traded one natural disaster for another -- they ended up in the path of Hurricane Frances. Since Saturday night, their new home has had no power, cell phone service or working phone lines.

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. - For an 87-year-old man, Harry Weinberg is in pretty good physical shape. When he is not caring for his bedridden wife, he walks in the mornings, and plays golf four times a week. So when he found himself breathless hours after Hurricane Frances pounded his Lake Worth retirement community, that meant things were quite hectic at his house. "I have to keep running into the bedroom to get the phone. The other ones don't work," Weinberg said over the telephone while taking a break from feeding lunch to Jean, his wife.

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. - As he stands in the abandoned street, his feet about shoulders' width apart for reinforcement, the man in the bright blue golf shirt seems not to notice his straw-colored hair spiraling from his forehead in the rising tropical gusts. It's Friday night, the monstrosity known as Hurricane Frances is gathering force above the Atlantic Ocean 80 miles east of here, and Mike Seidel, on-camera meteorologist, is bracing himself. "If you can't stay focused for an event like this," he says through the swirling winds, "you're really in the wrong business."

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. - Hurricane Frances left few parts of Florida untouched yesterday as its slow, cruel crawl across the peninsula left behind flooded roadways, downed power lines, uprooted trees and debris-strewn beaches. As many as 5 million people lost power, and the state's panhandle region braced to take its hit from the storm today. After pummeling parts of Florida's eastern coastline with rain for as long as 30 hours, the storm weakened as it crept west, with winds slowing to about 70 mph. By early evening, Frances was downgraded to a tropical storm as it approached Tampa en route to the Gulf of Mexico.

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. - Powerful winds and drenching rains battered Florida's eastern coastline yesterday as a potent but plodding Hurricane Frances slowed to a maddening crawl, prolonging the agony for millions of residents forced to wait through another night to see what damage the huge storm would deliver. The 70-mile-wide eye of the storm was not expected to reach land between West Palm Beach and Melbourne until early this morning, but by late yesterday it had already taken a toll on the state: As many as 2 million people were without electricity, and 90 mph winds radiating as far as 75 miles from the center ripped roofs off buildings and downed trees and power lines in some areas.