Jordan Sneakers, Cheap Jordan Shoes on Sale

Asian stocks fell Tuesday, dragged down by sharp losses in European markets the day before as fears mounted of a worsening global economy.

Oil slid to below $84 a barrel amid expectations that continued weakness in developed economies will crimp demand for crude. The dollar was higher against the euro but lower against the yen.

Japan’s Nikkei 225 index dropped 2.1 percent to 8,601.51, with shares of the country’s powerhouse export sector skidding lower as fears grow of another U.S. recession. Toshiba Corp. plunged 7 percent and Panasonic Corp. lost 3.1 percent.

Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 shed 1.5 percent to 4,080.90 and South Korea’s Kospi was down 1.9 percent at 1,751.22.

Hong Kong’s Hang Seng was down 0.9 percent at 19,432.32, with property developers hurt by speculation that the Chinese government may further slow investment in construction as it seeks to tamp down inflation and rebalance the economy.

Gold shares were among the few gainers Tuesday, as prices for the precious metal hovered near record highs. Hong Kong-listed Zijin Mining Group, China’s largest gold miner, rose 2 percent. Newcrest Mining Ltd., Australia’s No. 1 gold miner, rose 0.6 percent.

The declines in Asia come a day after European shares suffered sharp losses. Britain’s FTSE 100 closed down 3.6 percent to 5,102.58. Germany’s DAX tumbled 5.3 percent to 5,246.18, and France’s CAC-40 dived 4.7 percent to 2,999.54.

Wall Street, which was closed Monday due to the Labor Day holiday, was bracing for losses. Dow futures were down 2.5 percent at 10,925 and broader S&P 500 futures fell 2.8 percent to 1,136.80.

Worrisome U.S. employment figures and the possible spread of Europe’s sovereign debt crisis from small economies like Greece to major ones like Italy are stoking investor fears. Greece, Ireland and Portugal have already needed to be rescued with loans from the IMF and Europe, but Italy is regarded as too large to bail out.

“People are worrying about the U.S. economy and the worsening situation in Europe, especially Italy and Spain,” said Jackson Wong, vice president of Tanrich Securities in Hong Kong. “There are very big concerns in the market that they might not contain the situation in the short term.”

A wave of negative sentiment was unleashed Friday, when a government report said the U.S. economy failed to add any new jobs in August. That caused European and Asian stock markets to sink sharply Monday.

The August jobs figure was far below economists’ already tepid expectations for 93,000 new U.S. jobs and renewed concerns that the U.S. recovery is not only slowing but actually going into reverse.

U.S. hiring figures for June and July were also revised lower, adding to the gloom. The unemployment crisis has prompted President Barack Obama to schedule a major speech Thursday night to propose steps to stimulate hiring.

Benchmark oil for October delivery was down $2.78 to $83.67 in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Crude last settled at $86.45 on Friday because U.S. markets were closed Monday for the holiday.

In London, Brent crude for October delivery was up 36 cents at $110.44 on the ICE Futures exchange.

In currencies, the euro slid to $1.4054 from $1.4187 in New York late Friday as worries mounted about Greece’s ability to meet requirements set by international lenders to stave off a massive default on the country’s debts.

The dollar weakened to 76.82 yen from 76.87 yen. Last month, the dollar fell under 76 yen, which was a new post-World War II high for the Japanese currency.

Chinese Defense Ministry spokesman Yang Yujun 31, said the Chinese aircraft carrier platform trials has reached the intended purpose, is continuing in the shipyard for conversion and testing.

Yang Yujun said: “The aircraft carrier construction is a long-term complex projects, in the process will be conducting a series of scientific experiments and training, which is routine and normal, carrier platform trials have recently achieved the desired purpose Now continue in the shipyard for conversion and testing. ”

Yang Yujun said, follow-up on the carrier will be based on scientific experiments and the training to determine .

Outfielder Matt Diaz is returning to the Atlanta Braves after being acquired from the Pittsburgh Pirates for a player to be named.

The wild card-leading Braves also received cash considerations in the deal announced Wednesday, which was completed in time for 33-year-old Diaz to be eligible for the postseason roster.

Diaz played the previous five seasons in Atlanta and was one of the team’s top players off the bench. He left after the 2010 season to sign a two-year, $4.25 million deal with the Pirates.

This season, Diaz is hitting .259 (56-for-216) with 12 doubles and 19 RBIs in 100 games. He is expected to join the Braves in time for Wednesday night’s game against Washington.

Atlanta has an 8½-game lead over St. Louis for the NL wild card.

At least 50,000 people — both civilians and combatants — have been killed in Libya’s six-month war to oust strongman Moammar Gadhafi, a rebel military commander told CNN Tuesday.

The grim number was culled from death tolls reported in battle zones — including Benghazi, Misrata, Tripoli and the Nafusa Mountains — as well as from accounts from agencies such as the Red Cross, said Hisham Abu Hajer, the Tripoli Brigades coordinator.

The threat of even more bloodshed loomed as alarming reports of human rights violations surfaced and the leader of Libya’s interim council issued an ultimatum Tuesday for tribal leaders in towns still under the control of loyalists: Surrender peacefully or face fierce military battles come Saturday, after Eid al-Fitr festivities have drawn to a close.

Mustafa Abdul Jalil, head of the National Transitional Council, told reporters Tuesday that the rebels are in negotiations but will use brute force if the loyalists don’t give in.
Burned Gadhafi family nanny gets care
Gadhafi’s 19-year-old female executioner
‘Bad time to be a black man in Libya’
Moammar Gadhafi’s family photos

Jalil said the rebels hope to “avoid more bloodshed and to avoid more destruction and damage.” But in the end, he said, “It might have to be decided militarily. I hope this will not be the case.”

As fighting continued for the last bastions of Gadhafi’s grip, the longtime dictator’s whereabouts still were unknown. Members of his family, including Gadhafi’s wife, Safia, two sons — Mohamed and Hannibal — and daughter Aisha escaped to Algeria.

Mourad Benmehidi, Algeria’s ambassador to the United Nations, said his nation allowed them to enter on “humanitarian grounds.”

Unlike Libya’s other neighbors, Algeria has not recognized the authority of the National Transitional Council and the authoritarian government in Algiers has much to fear with Arab revolutions so close to home.

Jalil said Tuesday that the rebels would ask Algeria to extradite members of the Gadhafi family back to Libya. He also said that once Libyan liberation is complete, the country will set up courts to hear people’s complaints against the Gadhafi regime.

But significant battles still stood in the way of total victory, most notably at Sirte and Bani Walid in the north and Sabha in the south. There has been speculation that Gadhafi and his other sons could be hiding in one of those towns.

Rebel fighters forged ahead Tuesday toward Sirte, situated along the Mediterranean coast between the capital, Tripoli, and the opposition nerve center of Benghazi.

Tripoli residents greeted the end of Ramadan with celebratory gunfire amid news that one of Gadhafi’s most notorious sons, Khamis, died after a battle with rebel forces Sunday night in northwest Libya between Tarunah and Bani Walid.

A rebel commander said Khamis Gadhafi was buried in the area.

Members of his 32nd Brigade, the Khamis Brigade, were known for human rights abuses. Human Rights Watch said Monday that the brigade executed detainees a week ago in a warehouse near Tripoli.
Gadhafi town falls to rebels
Captives executed in Libya
Sadistic brutality in Libya
Lockerbie mastermind near death
Fight for water in Tripoli
RELATED TOPICS

* Libya
* Libyan Conflict
* Moammar Gadhafi
* Arab Spring

Forces led by Khamis Gadhafi also killed scores of captive civilians as they tried to retreat from Tripoli, according to Muneer Masoud Own, who said he survived the massacre. CNN could not independently verify the claim, though Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International both documented the alleged incident.

The United Nations voiced “extreme alarm” at the reports of “atrocious human rights violations” in Libya, including the summary executions.

“We are also deeply concerned about reports that there are still thousands of people unaccounted for who were arrested or taken prisoner by Gadhafi security forces either earlier in the conflict, or before it even started,” said Rupert Colville, spokesman for the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights.

“Given the gruesome discoveries that have taken place over the past few days, there is good reason to be extremely concerned for their safety,” Colville said. “We urge any members of the former regime in a position to reveal where prisoners have been held to do so, before more lives are lost.”

Another report, released Tuesday by Physicians for Human Rights, documented crimes committed in the city of Misrata, under siege from Gadhafi’s forces until rebels were finally able to win.

The report cited four witnesses who saw Gadhafi’s troops forcibly detain 107 civilians and used them as human shields to guard munitions from NATO strikes.

One father told the physicians group that soldiers forced his two young children to sit on a tank, and threatened the family, saying, “You’ll stay here, and if NATO attacks us, you’ll die too.”

The report said Gadhafi shielded weapons in markets, mosques and schools and detailed accounts of detention and torture.

In another instance, four witnesses told the group that Gadhafi’s forces demolished a home for the elderly and abducted 36 disabled, elderly, and homeless people whose whereabouts remain unknown.

Although Libya’s war is not over, signs of normalcy began to sprout in Tripoli Tuesday. Some shops reopened. Traffic picked up and humanitarian aid was trickling in. France reopened its embassy Monday and Britain said its personnel are preparing to do the same.

But food and water were in short supply.

The United Nations’ World Food Programme was dispatching about 600 tons of staple food commodities — wheat flour, pasta, vegetable oil and tomato paste — for the Red Cross to distribute in Tripoli.

The U.N. children’s agency was procuring 5 million liters (1.3 million gallons) of water to ship to Tripoli. The agency warned Libya was facing a potentially disastrous water shortage, mainly due to disruptions in the pipeline network serving areas that lack water resources.

Another of Gadhafi’s sons, businessman Saadi Gadhafi, has offered to negotiate an end to the war with the rebels, who he claimed cannot “build a new country without having us (at) the table.” He has made previous offers, though this time he appeared ready to cut loose from his father and his brother Saif al-Islam, once assumed to be the heir apparent.

“If (the rebels) agree to cooperate to save the country together (without my father and Saif) then it will be easy and fast. I promise!” Saadi Gadhafi said in an e-mail to CNN’s Nic Robertson.

 A Communist Party leader has told China’s Internet companies to tighten control over material online as Beijing cracks down on dissent and tries to block the rise of Middle East-style protests.

The party secretary for Beijing, Liu Qi, issued the warning following a visit this week to Sina Corp., which operates a popular microblogging site, according to the party-published newspaper Beijing Daily.

Internet companies should “strengthen management and firmly prevent the spread of fake and harmful information,” Liu was quoted as saying after the visit Monday to Sina. He said companies should “resist fake and negative information.”

Communist authorities encourage Internet use for education and business but are uneasy about its potential to spread dissent, especially after social networking and other websites played a key role in protests that brought down governments in Egypt and Tunisia.

Beijing is in the midst of one of its most sweeping crackdowns on dissent in years and has detained or questioned hundreds of activists, lawyers and others.

The government tries to block access to foreign websites deemed subversive and Chinese operators of websites where the public can post comments are required to watch the material and remove any that violates censorship rules.

The government’s censorship rules prompted Google Inc. to close its China search engine last year. Mainland users can see Google’s Chinese-language search site in Hong Kong but access is slower and the company’s China market share has shrunk.

The report on Liu’s warning gave no details of how Internet companies were expected to change their management.

Employees who answered the phone at Sina referred questions to a spokeswoman who did not answer her phone.

With Liu during the visit were Sina CEO Charles Chao and Kai-fu Lee, a former boss of Google’s China unit who runs a technology investment company, according to the Beijing Daily.

Chao told Forbes magazine in March that Sina’s microblogging site, Weibo, has at least 100 employees monitoring content 24 hours a day. The company said in May that the number of Weibo users had passed 140 million.

Also this week, the Beijing Internet Media Association, a government-sanctioned industry group, called on its 104 member companies to police Internet content, possibly prompted by Liu’s order.

“Propaganda guidance to the public should be led toward a correct direction,” the appeal said, according to the Beijing Daily. “Online news should be trustworthy and should not spread rumors or vulgar contents.”

Liu, the party secretary, also visited the headquarters of Youku.com Inc., a video portal, and talked with CEO Victor Koo, the report said.

China has the world’s biggest online population, with 485 million Internet users as of June 30, according to the government-sanctioned China National Internet Information Center.

Meanwhile, a major Chinese Internet commerce platform, Taobao, has told merchants that use its service to stop selling virtual private network and other software that allows Web surfers to avoid government filters.

Taobao, part of Alibaba Group, said it acted after finding VPNs were being used to visit foreign websites illegally. A company spokesman said Tuesday it took the action on its own without receiving government orders.

A Palestinian from the occupied West Bank commandeered a taxi in the Israeli city of Tel Aviv before dawn on Monday, stabbing the driver and then injuring seven others, including police officers, after crashing into a roadblock, a police spokeswoman said.

Police suspect the perpetrator, who was in his 20s and arrested at the scene where he was also injured, “carried out an assault for nationalist motives,” spokeswoman Luba Samri said.

She said the suspect was from the West Bank city of Nablus, and that he shouted “Allahu Akbar” (God is greatest) when he struggled with police as they arrested him.

The incident occurred near a nightclub in the Israeli commercial capital where criminal incidents are frequent, but where police have also been on the alert for possible attacks inside Israel after heightened tension along Israel’s borders with Gaza and Egypt in the past 10 days.

The assailant “stole a taxi cab and drove it to the nightclub with the express intent of carrying out an attack,” she said. He stabbed and injured the driver, then crashed into a police roadblock outside the club, and got out of the cab and stabbed officers and civilians, she added.

One of the eight people hurt was listed in a serious condition in hospital and the others suffered light to moderate injuries, Samri said.

The suspect was also injured while resisting arrest, although the type of wound he sustained, whether a gunshot or blows, was not immediately clear.

None of the Palestinian militant groups issued any immediate claim of responsibility for the incident.

Attacks by Palestinian militants in Israeli cities were common during an uprising that erupted in 2000 when peace talks failed, lasting roughly through 2006, but have been rare in the years since.

Some Israeli officials have expressed fears there could be renewed violence not only because of tensions with Gaza, but also ahead of a plan by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to seek U.N. recognition as a non-member state when the General Assembly convenes next month.

Israel objects to the Palestinian bid, calling it a unilateral step that bypasses peace negotiations, which froze a year ago in a dispute over Jewish settlements built on land Palestinians want for a state.

The violence related to the Gaza-Egypt border area has killed more than 40 on all sides — Israelis, Palestinians and Egyptians — since an August 18 gun attack that killed eight Israelis then sparked a series of clashes and assaults.

Libyan rebel forces were converging on Muammar Gaddafi’s hometown of Sirte on Monday, hoping to deliver the coup de grace of their revolution but uncertain if the fallen strongman was holed up there.

The fugitive Gaddafi’s exact whereabouts where still not known and it was possible he was still in hiding in Tripoli, five days after it fell to rebel forces and his 42-year-old reign collapsed.

NATO war planes struck at Sirte, on the Mediterranean coast, for a third day on Sunday, a spokesman for the multi-national alliance said in Brussels.

“We’re paying close attention to what’s happening in Sirte because we know that there are remnants of the regime that are there,” the spokesman said.

On the ground, rebel forces also closed in and said they would seize Sirte by force if negotiations for its surrender failed.

Gaddafi was born near Sirte, 450 km (300 miles) east of Tripoli, in 1942 and after he seized power in 1969 he built it up from a sleepy fishing village into an important city and power center of 100,000 people.

He still retains support and sympathy there, so whether or not he has chosen to retreat to the city to make a last stand, its capture will still be strategically and symbolically important to the rebels as they consolidate their victory.

One rebel commander said his forces were within 100 km (60 miles) of Sirte from the east and others were advancing from the west.

On the coastal highway east of Tripoli, tank transporters were carrying Soviet-designed T-55 tanks in the direction of Sirte. Rebels said the tanks were seized from an abandoned military base in Zlitan.

SKIRMISHES

Jamal Tunally, a rebel military commander in Misrata, told Reuters: “The front line is 30 km from Sirte. We think the Sirte situation will be resolved peacefully, God willing.”

“Now we just need to find Gaddafi. I think he is still hiding underneath Bab al-Aziziyah like a rat,” said Tunally, referring to Gaddafi’s compound in Tripoli which rebels overran on Tuesday.

In the east, rebel fighters pushed 7 km (4 miles) past the village of Bin Jawad and secured the Nawfaliyah junction, a rebel spokesman said.

“We’re going slowly,” spokesman Mohammad Zawawi told Reuters. “We want to give more time for negotiations, to give a chance for those people trying to persuade the people inside Sirte to surrender and open their city.”

In Tripoli, the rebel leadership sought to establish control after days of confusion and sporadic skirmishing with the remnants of Gaddafi’s forces. Several explosions and intermittent gunfire were heard overnight Sunday.

The stench of rotting bodies and burning garbage still hung over the city and food, water and other supplies were running short, indications that despite the euphoria of victory, plenty of challenges lay ahead.

Gaddafi, 69, is on the run and the fear among his foes is that he intends to lead an insurgency against them. NTC officials rejected any idea of talks with him, saying he was a criminal who must be brought to justice.

“We did not negotiate when we were weak, and we won’t negotiate now that we have liberated all of Libya,” NTC information minister Mahmoud Shammam told a news conference.

The Associated Press earlier quoted Gaddafi’s spokesman, Moussa Ibrahim, as saying Gaddafi was still in Libya and wanted to discuss forming a transitional government with the NTC.

NTC officials say Gaddafi, his son Saif al-Islam and his spy chief should be tried in Libya, although they are wanted by the International Criminal Court for crimes against humanity.

The NTC and its Western backers are acutely aware of the need to prevent Libya collapsing into the kind of chaos that plagued Iraq for years after the U.S.-led invasion of 2003.

The de facto government, whose leaders plan to move to Tripoli from Benghazi this week, is trying to impose security, restore basic services and revive the energy–based economy.

But in the aftermath of victory, many corpses have been found, some of slain Gaddafi soldiers, others the victims of killings in cold blood.

A Libyan official said 75 bodies had been found at the Abu Salim hospital, which was caught up in heavy fighting, and another 35 corpses were found at the Yurmuk hospital.

The possibility that rebel fighters executed captured Gaddafi soldiers would pose an image problem for the NTC.

Rebel military spokesman Colonel Ahmed Bani said there was concern for the fate of 40,000 prisoners who he said had been detained by Gaddafi’s forces and who were still unaccounted for. It was possible some were being held in underground bunkers in Tripoli that rebels had been unable to locate.

GOOD OMENS

In good omens for economic recovery, officials said a vital gas export pipeline to Europe had been repaired and Libya’s biggest refinery had survived the war intact.

In the west, Tunisian authorities reopened the main border crossing into Libya, restoring a supply route for Tripoli, after Gaddafi forces were driven out on Friday.

That should help relieve a looming humanitarian crisis in the city, where food, drinking water and medicines are scarce.

Trucks loaded with food and other goods were already moving across the Ras Jdir crossing toward Tripoli, about two hours’ drive away.

Tripoli residents queued for bread or scoured grocery shops for food. Many took a stoical view of their plight.

“This is a tax we pay for our freedom,” said Sanusi Idhan, a layer waiting to buy food.

The NTC issued messages urging electricity workers to get back to work and efforts to pay the salaries of public sector workers were underway.

JACKSON HOLE, Wyoming (Reuters) – Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke on Friday stopped short of detailing further action to boost the U.S. recovery but said the central bank would consider what more it could do to fight high unemployment, giving some comfort to investors.

Bernanke said the Fed had marked down its outlook for U.S. economic growth and announced it would extend its September policy meeting to two days to consider its options. But he said the onus for boosting long-term growth prospects lay at the feet of the White House and the U.S. Congress.

“It is clear the recovery from the crisis has been much less robust than we had hoped,” he told an annual Fed conference here.

Under Bernanke’s leadership, the U.S. central bank launched an unprecedented array of measures to steer the economy away from what could have been a second Great Depression.

A weak raft of data has led analysts to say chances of a new recession could range as high as 50 percent.

The economy grew at a paltry 1 percent annual rate in the second quarter, the government said on Friday, after expanding only 0.4 percent during the first three months of the year. At the same time, Europe is strangled by a debt crisis that is undercutting recovery there.

“The growth fundamentals of the United States do not appear to have been permanently altered by the shocks of the past four years,” Bernanke said.

“The economic healing will take a while, and there may be setbacks along the way,” he added. “However … the healing process should not leave major scars.”

His optimism carried an important caveat. He said if policymakers failed to bring down the “extraordinarily” high level of U.S. long-term unemployment, jobs skills could atrophy, harming the economy’s long-run potential.

The jobless rate stood at 9.1 percent in July, with nearly half of the unemployed out of work for 27 weeks or more.

Financial markets gave a volatile reception to Bernanke’s speech; some participants had expected fresh details on steps the Fed could take to spur stronger growth.

Stocks initially fell sharply, with the Dow Jones industrial average dropping as much as 220 points, but shared ended higher as investors saw the door still open for a renewed effort at lifting growth. The Dow rose 1.2 percent, while the tech-laden Nasdaq jumped nearly 2.5 percent.

The dollar initially rallied then gave up its gains, while government bond prices rose.

EXAMINING OPTIONS

Bernanke made plain the central bank’s policy-setting Federal Open Market Committee, which next meets on September 20 and 21, found recent developments troubling. However, he said most policies that would ensure a solid foundation for long-term growth were outside the Fed’s province.

He said Europe’s debt struggles, a bruising summer political battle over the U.S. budget and a decision by Standard & Poor’s to strip the United States of its coveted AAA credit rating lay behind the gut-wrenching market volatility in recent weeks, which had harmed growth prospects.

“Financial stress has been and continues to be a significant drag on the recovery, both here and abroad,” he said.

The Fed chief said the economy could benefit over the long haul by putting the U.S. budget on a sustainable path, and he suggested Washington explore ways to make the budget process less contentious. He warned, however, that tightening fiscal policy too soon could harm the fragile recovery.

Julian Callow, an economist at Barclays Capital in London, said incoming economic data would determine if Bernanke can form a consensus at the central bank to provide further support for the sputtering recovery.

“He was rather boxed in terms of what he could say,” Callow said. “The markets have been increasing pressure on him to say more, but he needs to take the FOMC with him.”

Earlier this month, the Fed said it expected to hold overnight U.S. interest rates near zero for at least the next two years, a move that elicited three dissents — something the central bank has not seen since 1992.

RECESSION WATCH

As gloomy news on the U.S. economy mounted in recent weeks, stock markets plunged and speculation grew the Fed would crank up its crisis-fighting operation.

Some investors hope the central bank, which has already bought $2.3 trillion in bonds, will launch a fresh round of purchases, although many analysts think more modest steps, such as shifting the Fed’s securities holdings into longer maturities, are more likely.

“We continue to think the odds are tilted slightly in favor of the Fed taking further stimulative action at the next FOMC meeting, likely altering the composition of the Fed’s balance sheet,” JPMorgan economist Michael Feroli said.

Bernanke simply reiterated language from the Fed’s latest policy statement that the central bank was examining its options and was prepared to act as needed, while repeating the Fed’s view that easing commodity prices should bring inflation into line with the Fed’s 2 percent or under goal.

In an interview with CNBC, Philadelphia Federal Reserve Bank President Charles Plosser said further bond purchases by the Fed would do the economy little good.

“I’m not sure it would be beneficial to the problems that we are facing,” Plosser said.

Plosser, a noted inflation hawk, was one of the officials who dissented at the Fed’s August 9 meeting.

Fed officials have discussed buying more longer-term debt and selling short-term securities, an operation that could increase downward pressures on long-term interest rates without further bloating the central bank’s balance sheet.

Long-term Treasury yields are an important benchmark for home and auto loans. In addition, a shift in the Fed’s portfolio could push some yield-hungry investors into other assets, such as stocks and corporate bonds, perhaps spurring stronger spending.

But some officials think an effort to “twist” down the longer end of the interest rate curve might do little good.

“A twist operation would not have every much effect. It’s been analyzed many times,” St. Louis Federal Reserve Bank President James Bullard told Reuters.

HOUSTON (Reuters) – The night before Hurricane Ike made landfall in Texas almost three years ago, four of us were packed into one hotel room in downtown Houston. Security knocked on the door requesting that we sign a waiver promising not to sue if we were killed in the storm.

As we worked through the night to cover the storm for Reuters, the winds really picked up. You could see and feel the thick glass in the hotel window move back and forth. Large pieces of twisted metal flew by the window. We had a front row seat to watch windows shatter and pop in nearby skyscrapers, including Enron’s old headquarters. The hotel’s rooftop skylight blew out, raining glass on floors below.

We had made a flurry of preparations to ensure our news bureau would continue to run. Bottled water was purchased, cars were gassed up and hotel reservations were made. We brought cots into the office.

A colleague and I went to the supermarket to buy food for everyone who would be working day and night in coming weeks. There, we encountered long lines and people pushing shopping carts brimming with bottles of wine and six packs of beer.

Days earlier, when forecasts had put the strong Category 2 storm on course for a direct hit in Galveston Island, only 50 miles from downtown Houston, my stomach started to hurt. It really hurt.

As Ike moved closer, I made a quick dash to my apartment where I moved all the furniture away from the windows and covered it with blankets. I moved all the plants off my balcony and made a nest at the back of the closet for my cat, Pete. I locked the door and hoped for the best.

THE AFTERMATH

By the time the winds died down, the cost for damage from Ike, the last hurricane to make landfall in the United States was $19 billion. The storm, which hit on September 13, 2008, killed more than 100 people, many of whom stayed home in coastal areas to ride out the storm.

The streets in Houston’s downtown were impassable the morning after the hurricane, filled with broken window glass, fallen trees and other debris. A brick wall toppled at our office building. Once inside, the glass walkway to the parking garage was obliterated. Water was pooled everywhere but there was electricity so we could work in the air conditioning.

Power was out throughout much of the city for weeks. Roofs were gone, homes were battered and hundreds of the city’s massive old live oak trees were felled. Two of us went for a drive in an SUV rented by the company. Stoplights were out and we had to drive the wrong way down streets to avoid debris. Some roads were blocked by deep pools of water.

People gathered around outlets at places like Target to charge their cell phones. Gas pumps did not work, a crippling blow for a city that relies heavily on transportation by car.

Some homes and businesses did not have electricity restored for weeks. My apartment building, which was largely spared wind and water damage, did not have power or water for two weeks. I had nowhere else to stay. Hotels were booked from Houston to Austin, 180 miles away.

To prepare, I had filled both my bathtubs with water, but only one stayed filled. After a week that water ran out, so I would take a bucket to the pool and fill it so I could flush the toilet. At night I would sit on the balcony reading until the sun went down.

Everything in my freezer melted, but it was days before I had time to clean it up. A box of Popsicles melted, leaving a sticky rainbow-colored mess. Chicken rotted and to this day, I think the freezer still smells funny.

Very hot weather returned to Houston days after the storm, pushing up the temperature in my apartment as high as 90 degrees (32 Celsius). To escape, I slept on the balcony on a quilt, wishing for a mosquito net. I showered at friends’ houses who had water or in hotel rooms that visiting reporters were occupying.

Finally after two weeks, life returned mostly to normal. It took about a year for all the broken windows in the city’s skyscrapers to be repaired. Some houses still are covered with the blue tarps meant to be a temporary fix for storm-damaged roofs. People are still fighting with the government and insurance companies over hurricane claims.

I was a hurricane novice who had good advice from colleagues who had weathered a number of storms and knew not to underestimate their power. If Irene blows through New York, I can only imagine what it will mean for a city that can be slowed by heavy rain.

And if you’re wondering what became of Pete, the cat — he was just fine.

NEW YORK – The nation’s largest subway system and arriving flights at the five main New York City-area airports were preparing to shut down Saturday as Hurricane Irene spun its way up the Eastern Seaboard, forcing more than 300,000 evacuations and dimming lights at Citi Field and on Broadway.

By deciding to shut down the transit system by noon, millions of carless New Yorkers from the Bronx’s most distant reaches down through Manhattan and out to the beaches of Brooklyn and Queens will be faced with the question of where to go and how to get there.

Among them are 82-year-old Abe Feinstein, who has lived since the early 1960s on the eighth floor of a building that overlooks the famed boardwalk of Coney Island, which is in the evacuation zone and was alive with residents and visitors Friday.

“How can I get out of Coney Island? What am I going to do? Run with this walker?” he said.

But Feinstein also wasn’t too worried.

He recalled watching a hurricane in 1985 from an apartment down the street from where he lives now.

“I have nothing to worry about,” Feinstein said. “I’ve been through bad weather before. It’s just not going to be a problem for us.”

No new evacuations were ordered as of Saturday morning.

Bridges and tunnels also could be closed as the storm approaches, clogging traffic in an already congested city.

The five main New York City-area airports were scheduled to close at noon Saturday for arriving domestic and international flights. Three of them, Kennedy, LaGuardia and Newark Liberty, are among the nation’s busiest.

Officials hoped most residents would stay with family and friends, and for the rest the city opened nearly 100 shelters with a capacity of 71,000 people.

Irene was expected to make landfall in North Carolina on Saturday, then roll up the Interstate 95 corridor reaching New York on Sunday. A hurricane warning was issued for the city Friday afternoon, the first time that’s happened since Gloria in 1985.

If the storm stays on its current path, skyscraper windows could shatter, tree limbs would fall and debris would be tossed around. Streets in the southern tip of the city could be under a few feet of water, and police readied rescue boats but said they wouldn’t go out if conditions were poor.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg said he was confident people would get out of the storm’s way.

“We do not have the manpower to go door-to-door and drag people out of their homes,” he said. “Nobody’s going to get fined. Nobody’s going to go to jail. But if you don’t follow this, people might die.”

Nevertheless, he said that for those who don’t heed the warnings, police officers would use loudspeakers on patrol vehicles to spread the word about the evacuation Saturday.

Several New York landmarks were under the evacuation order, including the Battery Park City area, where tourists catch ferries to the Statue of Liberty. Construction was stopping throughout the city, and workers at the World Trade Center site were dismantling a crane and securing equipment. Bloomberg said there would be no effect on the Sept. 11 memorial opening the day after the 10th anniversary of the terrorist attacks.

But sporting events, concerts and even Broadway were going dark.

New flood gates were put in place outside Citi Field as a precaution, but Major League Baseball took no chances. The Braves-Mets games Saturday and Sunday were postponed, to be made up as a doubleheader on Sept. 8.

All Broadway musicals and plays were canceled for Saturday and Sunday, as well as “Zarkana” by Cirque du Soleil at Radio City Music Hall and Lincoln Center Theater’s “War Horse.” It’s the first time Broadway has shut down for an emergency since the blackout in 2003.

In lower Manhattan, Milton Melendez and partner Shea Collins were headed uptown to a neighborhood north of Little Italy. Melendez, who survived Hurricane David as a child in the Dominican Republic, was worried about their apartment windows being blown out. Collins was a little more blase.

“This is the same thing as a snowstorm,” she said. “They say there’s going to be 10 feet and there’s four inches.”

Bloomberg weathered criticism after a Dec. 26 storm dumped nearly two feet of snow that seemed to catch officials by surprise. Subway trains, buses and ambulances got stuck in the snow, some for hours, and streets were impassable for days. Bloomberg ultimately called it an “inadequate and unacceptable” response.

This time officials weren’t taking any chances. Transit officials said they can’t run once sustained winds reach 39 mph, and they need eight hours to move trains and equipment to safety.

The subway system won’t reopen until at least Monday, after pumps remove water from flooded stations. Even on a dry day, about 200 pump rooms remove 13 million to 15 million gallons of water that seep into the tunnels deep underground.

About 1.6 million people live in Manhattan, and about 6.8 million live in the city’s other four boroughs.

For those with cars, parking was available at the city’s evacuation centers. From there, each family will be assigned to a shelter and taken there by bus.

In the Queens community of the Rockaways, more than 111,000 people live on a barrier peninsula connected to the city by two bridges and to Long Island to the west. Everyone there was ordered to evacuate, which brought the total in the city to 370,000, city officials said.

The city’s public transit system carries about 5 million passengers on an average weekday, and the entire system has never before been halted because of a natural disaster. It was seriously hobbled by an August 2007 rainstorm that disabled or delayed every one of the city’s subway lines. And it was shut down after the 9/11 attacks and during a 2005 strike.

In the past 200 years, New York has seen only a few significant hurricanes. In September 1821, a hurricane raised tides by 13 feet in an hour and flooded the southernmost tip of Manhattan in an area that now includes Wall Street and the World Trade Center memorial. In 1938, a storm dubbed the Long Island Express came ashore about 75 miles east of the city on neighboring Long Island and then hit New England, killing 700 people and leaving 63,000 homeless.

And in 1944, Midtown was flooded, where Times Square, Broadway theaters and the Empire State Building are located.