What to know about powerful Hurricane Erin as it heads toward the US East Coast

Island communities off the coast of North Carolina are bracing for flooding ahead of the year’s first Atlantic hurricane, Hurricane Erin .

Although forecasters are confident that the storm won’t make direct landfall in the United States, authorities on a few islands along North Carolina’s Outer Banks issued evacuation orders and warned that some roads could be swamped by waves of 15 feet (4.6 meters).