States of emergency in advance of Hurricane Irene's expected assault on the East Coast this weekend have led to busted plans likely to affect businesses and travelers' wallets.
Travelers are scrambling to revise airplane and train tickets while hotels deal with cancelled reservations. The 11 casinos in Atlantic City are deciding whether to close as casino executives meet Friday afternoon with local and state emergency management officials, according to the Associated Press.
Virginia, Maryland, North Carolina, New York, New Jersey, Connecticut and counties in South Carolina have declared states of emergency.
Andy Fink, an evening manager at the Dayton House Resort in Myrtle Beach, S.C., said the effect of Hurricane Irene is not yet as harsh as that of Hurricane Charley in 2004, when the resort had to implement a mandatory evacuation of its guests. But even with the area on watch for a tropical storm, there have been about 20 cancelled reservations in two days.
Fink said many of his guests were from New Jersey and many checked out to return home ahead of the storm.
"One guest left today to get his pets out of their house before they close the roads," Fink said.
Courtesy of Ashley Martin
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Watch Video At the beginning of the week, the resort, which has a seven-day cancellation policy and a non-refundable deposit, gave guests who wanted to cancel their reservations full refunds, with a $20 service fee for staff services and credit card processing.
Erica Jackson, a guest at the resort from Bristol, Tenn., planned to have her dream beach wedding through the Myrtle Beach Wedding Chapel on Friday and stay in town until Sunday. Instead, her family decided to push the wedding to Wednesday evening and drove back to Tennessee on Thursday.
"It has always been my dream since I was a little girl to get married on the beach," she said.
The resort agreed to give her credit for future use for the block of rooms she reserved.
Ashley Martin, the chapel manager, said out of five weddings scheduled for Saturday, two couples postponed until a later date, one couple cancelled completely, and two couples planned to proceed as scheduled.
"One of them is rather large, with a DJ and everything," Martin said. "We told her we could still try but we stressed the electricity could go out."
Martin said at the beginning of the week she considered evacuating her family, which includes her 2-year-old son and her disabled mother-in-law. The family-run business was concerned for the safety of the brides coming, and has been communicating "a lot" with her brides and grooms.
"We tell everybody, 'I heard rain is good luck on your wedding day.' That could be uplifting," she said.
There were at least 448 expected weddings this weekend in north and central New Jersey, 401 in North Carolina, 264 in Virginia, 264 in Connecticut, 209 in South Carolina, and 151 in South Jersey, according to The Knot Wedding Network.
If the hurricane hits those areas, chances are couples will have to reschedule, postpone or cancel weddings, said Amy Eisinger, associate editor of WeddingChannel.com, which is owned by XO Group Inc., formerly The Knot Inc.
Items like rental equipment, lighting, draping and tents will most likely not be eligible for refunds, Eisinger said.
"I wish I could give a happier answer, but it's really unfortunate," she said. "You're probably going to lose a significant amount of what you invested because you're making the decision so close to the date of wedding."
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