Mobile Area Chamber of Commerce

The City of Mobile fired one employee and put two others on leave following the loss of nearly $15 million dollars to a scam connected to new municipal arena. Mobile Mayor Spiro Cheriogotis announced the action regarding staff while assuring the public that there’s no evidence that the crime was an “inside job.”

People in the Florida Panhandle and southern Alabama cleaned up after Hurricane Isaias swept through as the storm's remnants caused flooding in North Carolina on Sunday, while powerful Pacific Ocean waves stirred up by Rachel, a former tropical storm, battered the coast of Southern California.

As people in the Florida Panhandle and southern Alabama cleaned up in the wake of Isaias, heavy rainfall was bringing the risk of flooding Sunday across the central Appalachians and the mid-Atlantic region as the storm's remnants moved north.

Published reports say that heavy winds from Hurricane Isaias led to two fatalities in Alabama and Florida (updated to four.) NBC news reports that one person was killed in East Birmingham when a tree fell on a house. Another person was trapped. CBS News reports a woman in Escambia County, Florida died when a tree hit her house in the winds of Isaias. The other two fatalities also resulted from trees hitting homes.

Hundreds of thousands of people in Alabama and the Florida Panhandle were without power early Saturday after Isaias crashed into the U.S. Gulf Coast as a dangerous hurricane and left flooded roads and downed trees in its wake as it moved inland. Poweroutage.us reports 300,000 in Alabama in the dark this morning, and 400,000 more in Florida.

Hurricane Isaias is forecast to miss the oil industry’s biggest hubs along the Gulf Coast, but could still nudge fuel prices higher if it triggers power outages that shut down refineries for processing crude, according to experts. An extended refinery shutdown would impact fuel supplies that already have taken a hit from the U.S. war against Iran and Russia’s war against Ukraine.

Residents boarded up windows and stacked sandbags Thursday while thousands of National Guard soldiers were deploying in anticipation of Hurricane Isaias, which packed swift winds and threatened to bring a storm surge with devastating floods to the U.S. Gulf Coast.

Isaias strengthened into a Category 2 hurricane as it barreled toward a possible landfall on Alabama’s border with Florida. The approach of the storm is prompting orders for tourists to abandon beaches for safer spots inland, sending locals scurrying for gas and groceries and leading fishing crews to secure their boats before the potentially destructive storm’s arrival.

Residents of Alabama, coastal Mississippi, and the western Florida panhandle are getting ready for rough ride from Hurricane Isaias. Forecasters are predicting landfall late Friday or early Saturday. That hit could occur anywhere from Ocean Springs in Mississippi, to Mobile and the Eastern Shore in Alabama, to the western Florida panhandle. The lower third of our state is facing the possibility of tropical storm force winds and rain. Mike Evans is manager of Mobile County Emergency Management. He says residents need to get storm updates from a trusted source like the National Weather Service.

Some coastal residents of Alabama are being advised to voluntarily evacuate as Isaias surged toward the U.S. Gulf Coast on Thursday. It’s the first hurricane of the Atlantic season, prompting mandatory evacuations and school closures in parts of Florida. Isaias was forecast to intensify rapidly and bring strong winds and a life-threatening storm surge to the Florida Panhandle, southern Alabama and southern Mississippi when it makes landfall on the northern Gulf Coast late Friday or early Saturday. Heavy rain with the risk of flooding was possible into the weekend as far inland as the Tennessee Valley.