Charleston’s U.S. Coast Guard spent Thursday moving life-saving resources from their office to a location about 10 miles west of the city, so the equipment is safe in the event they need to be used.
Capt. John Reed, however, advises people to evacuate and not wait out the storm.
“The conditions are still good to get out of town,” he says. “The ability of you and your family to move and get out of the way of the storm, to get to a place wherever and ride it out safely, I would definitely recommend doing so.”
For a city that’s under mandatory evacuation, there were a surprising amount of people outside enjoying the day by the waterfront, before the storm moves through.
Although the storm has weakened, forecasts predict there could still be some very serious flooding along the South Carolina coast.
“I think people are curious; they know the storm is still a couple hundred miles away, so they come down and walk around, and most of us are bored at this point because we've been preparing for this for a week and it’s still not here," says Charleston resident Basil Papaharis.
For the last couple of days, eastbound lanes on Interstate 26, the major highway out of Charleston, had been reversed so all lanes of traffic went out of the city toward Columbia to a safer zone. Thursday, officials say those reversals end, so they are cautioning anyone who might still be on the fence and considering evacuating to do so before this evening.