Henri weakens after rains drench New York concertgoers

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NEW YORK — Storm Henri weakened as it neared the U.S. Northeast coast on Sunday morning, but not before a drenching rainstorm submerged a star-studded concert meant to mark New York City’s emergence from the worst of the coronavirus pandemic.

A light rain that turned into a downpour on Saturday night sent thousands of music fans at the free “Homecoming Concert” in Manhattan’s Central Park streaming for the exits in the middle of a performance by Barry Manilow, who continued to sing for a while even after his audio was cut off. Performers who did not get to go on because of the concert’s abrupt ending included Bruce Springsteen, Elvis Costello and the Killers.

Thousands of concertgoers, some still lining up to get in as the show was emptying out, had navigated through an airport-style security checkpoint where they also had to show proof of vaccination against the coronavirus to gain entrance.

The concert had been promoted for weeks by Mayor Bill de Blasio to show the city’s resilience against the pandemic.

Its unplanned early ending as Henri, then still a low-level hurricane, churned up the Eastern Seaboard, left CNN, which was broadcasting it live, with air time to fill, which it did in part by having Manilow call into the network and sing.

By 11 a.m. EDT (1500 GMT) on Sunday, Henri had been downgraded to a tropical storm with maximum sustained winds of about 60 mph (95 kph) with its center 15 miles (25 km) off Montauk, New York, on the eastern tip of Long Island, the U.S. National Hurricane Center (NHC) said.

The center of the storm was expected to reach the Rhode Island coast on Sunday afternoon.

But its rain bands stretched from eastern Pennsylvania to southern New Hampshire, covering northern New Jersey, the New York metropolitan area and southern New England.

While the NHC lifted storm surge alerts for western Long Island and parts of Massachusetts’ Cape Cod, warnings were still in effect for most of Long Island and southern New England with predicted coastal surge ranging from 2 to 4 feet (0.6 to 1.2 m) in many places.

The NHC’s tropical storm warning covered more than 42 million people.

As Henri’s winds weakened, most of the concern shifted to the potential for flooding, with the NHC predicting rainfall amounts of 3-6 inches (7.5-15 cm) in much of the affected region as the storm’s movement was expected to slow over land.

“Heavy rainfall from Henri may result in considerable flash, urban, and small stream flooding, along with the potential for widespread minor to isolated moderate river flooding,” the NHC said.

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said he was particularly worried about flooding in the Catskill Mountains north of New York City.

“We already have saturated ground, so the absorption capacity of the ground is limited, and that’s what makes this level of rainfall especially problematic,” Cuomo said at a briefing.

President Joe Biden on Sunday authorized the Federal Emergency Management Agency to coordinate disaster relief efforts in New York if they are needed. (Writing and additional reporting by Peter Szekely in New York; Editing by Daniel Wallis, Diane Craft and Susan Fenton)