Cellphones working despite hurricane

NEW YORK — Wireless networks fell quiet Sunday in some coastal areas of North Carolina and southern Virginia, but calls were going through in most areas affected by Tropical Storm Irene, the Federal Communications Commission said.

Networks in the biggest population center in the path of the storm, the greater New York metropolitan area, were largely spared.

About 400 cell towers were offline in North Carolina and Virginia, with power outages the chief reason. An additional 200 towers were running on backup power by Saturday night and could go silent as their backup batteries or generators run dry, Barnett said.

Landline phone service failed for about 125,000 households on the coast, the FCC said. An additional 250,000 have lost cable service, and some of them could have phone service from the cable company, which would then also be out.

FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski said the 911 system has held up well.

Tropical Storm

heads for Atlantic

HAMILTON, Bermuda — Tropical Storm Jose spun just to the west of Bermuda on Sunday, buffeting the wealthy British territory with gusty winds and intermittent showers before heading out into the open Atlantic.

The 10th named storm of the season passed about 80 miles northwest of Bermuda with sustained winds of 45 mph, causing some storm surge in western parts of the isolated island chain. There were no immediate reports of any damage or injuries, and a tropical-storm warning was lifted Sunday night.

Intermittent showers mixed with sunshine in Bermuda, which lies about 580 miles east of Cape Hatteras, North Carolina, already battered by Hurricane Irene.

Jose was moving north at about 20 mph Sunday night, according to the U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami, Fla.

U.S. meteorologist Jeff Masters, who writes a popular weather blog, said Tropical Storm Jose would not survive long because of strong, upper-level wind shear from Irene.

Typhoon moves

into Taiwan

MANILA, Philippines — Typhoon Nanmadol slammed into Taiwan on Monday, unleashing heavy winds and torrential downpours that closed schools and offices and prompted the evacuation of thousands of people in the landslide-prone south.

Nanmadol made landfall just before daybreak in Taitung county in the remote southeast and headed toward heavily populated coastal areas on the west coast. It had winds of 68 mph, down from earlier peaks almost twice that high.

It hit Taiwan after killing at least 12 people in the Philippines, and was expected to pass about 130 miles south of Taiwan's capital, Taipei, before heading for the Taiwan Strait and the eastern coast of China.

The storm dumped almost 20 inches of rain in the mountainous south, where vulnerability to catastrophic landslides led to the evacuation of some 8,000 people.

With its enormous cloud band, the slow-moving typhoon drenched the northern part of the Philippines with rain for days before pummeling the area with fierce winds, setting off landslides and floods.

Seattle Times news services