DUCK, N.C. -- As Hurricane Bonnie bore down on North Carolina's Outer Banks for an expected landfall today, some 330,000 vacationers and residents evacuated the thin necklace of islands in a grim, bumper-to-bumper procession toward safer ground.

As night fell, Bonnie was about the size of Texas and packing 115-mph winds -- the same strength that blew apart so much of coastal North Carolina only two years ago.

The threat was enough to darken the streets of the barrier island towns. A few restaurants and gas stations remained open, but many were boarded up, windows taped in anticipation of high winds.

In Duck, Fishbones was one of the few restaurants to remain open last night -- it's sign said, "Hurricane, shmurricane. Open."

Owner John Kotch said he served about 70 people last night -- mostly locals -- substantially down from the 200 to 250 he averages on a summer night.

Eating a late-night dinner while watching the Weather Channel, Kotch still hoped the storm would pass by. "It could veer off, make a right turn and miss us, or it could go inland," he said as he closed the restaurant about 10 p.m.

It was anybody's guess where the storm would hit.

"This storm is huge, and it's flip-flopping around," said Cathy Henry, spokeswoman for the North Carolina Emergency Management Department.

On Monday, Bonnie's path was so slow and wobbly that forecasters were unsure when or even whether it might hit land.

But by last night, the storm was centered about 215 miles south of Cape Lookout, N.C., and was pushing toward the northwest at 14 mph -- nearly three times faster than a day earlier.

The entire coast prepared yesterday for what could be devastating effects of the season's first hurricane.

Officials said the evacuation, which was mandatory in most North Carolina coastal communities and in two South Carolina counties, proceeded without any reported problems, but traffic was heavy throughout the day.

The northbound lanes of Highway 158, which leads from the Outer Banks toward Virginia, became jammed at times as thousands of cars streamed northward, most carrying evidence of vacations shortened by Bonnie. Some trailed boats, others had kayaks and boogie boards strapped to their roofs.

Almost all carried parents and children with long faces -- facing even longer car trips back home.

"I wanted to stay," said a pouting Adam Bostwick, 11, of Germantown, Md., as his family joined the line of vehicles leaving the Outer Banks.

But with Hurricane Felix of 1993 fresh in his mother's mind, the family decided to leave Duck halfway through their vacation.

"That time, the house was completely lost," said Kiki Bostwick. She recalled how the family fled a beach house in Sandbridge, Va., in 1993 and saw footage of the house on a TV newscast that night caving in under Felix's wrath.

Hurricane warnings were posted from Chincoteague, Va., to Cape Romain, S.C. Swimming was banned at beaches as far north as New York's Long Island. Four New Jersey lifeguards had to be rescued yesterday after being overpowered by rough surf at Point Pleasant Beach.

About 60 Navy ships at Norfolk, Va., were instructed to leave port and ride out the storm 300 miles at sea. Other ships were being moved to inland waterways.

At Pope Air Force Base, N.C., "every plane that is flyable is leaving," said Lt. Tisha McGarry, a spokeswoman. Fighter jets also were leaving Seymour Johnson Air Force Base in North Carolina.

Passenger ferries to North Carolina's Outer Banks were shut down, 85 shelters were opened and utility crews geared up to repair damage.

Carolina Power and Light, the local utility, called out extra crews and stationed them at a fairgrounds in Raleigh, N.C., so they could be dispatched quickly to storm-damaged areas, a utility spokeswoman said.

North Carolina Gov. James B. Hunt Jr. declared a state of emergency yesterday afternoon, and counties along the coast set up shelters for residents forced to leave their homes. Wrightsville Beach, normally packed at this time of year with people trying for that last bit of summer tan, was all but deserted by last night.

Some residents refused to leave.

"We call it a mandatory evacuation, but that's more strong words than anything," said Sam Burgess, spokesman for the New Hanover Emergency Operations Center. "We can't hold a gun to their heads. If they won't go, we try to shake them up a little emotionally by asking them who's their next of kin. Sometimes that's better than a gun."

Kim Levengood, 37, and Susan Fred, 35, decided to wait for the start of the storm in the Barbary Coast, a Wilmington down-home bar where a 180-pound English mastiff named Hercules looks as in place as the beer.

"Here we go one more time -- at least," Levengood said. "But we're strong people. We can take it."

Thousands of others heeded the warnings, flooding the highways and doing what they could to protect their property.

The Duck-N-II, a rest stop in Currituck, N.C., was packed last night with weary travelers bearing tales of ruined vacations.

The 23-member Gorman family said they drove down to Nags Head from Mount Airy, Md., Saturday to see the Outer Banks for the first time. Steve Gorman, 33, who paints cars at a Bethesda car dealership, said the family paid $4,500 for their house at the beach.

"The Outer Banks, that was the ticket. We had a nice big house, a built-in pool and, of course, the ocean," Gorman said wistfully.

But he remained optimistic about returning quickly.

"Hopefully this will pass and maybe we can come back down later in the week," he said.

At the Duck-N-II convenience store, crowds lined up to buy ice and cold drinks.

"From 4 o'clock in the morning on, it's been like this. It's worse than even a weekend in August here," said Linda Coy, the store manager, eyeing the throngs that lined up three and four deep at the cash registers.

North Carolina has been through this before, often and recently. In 1996, Hurricane Bertha whipped through the barrier islands to the coastline and into the farmlands of the southeastern part of the state on July 12.

The storm caused millions of dollars in damage, mostly to crops, but then Hurricane Fran came along Sept. 5 and made Bertha look like a sprinkling beach shower in a gentle breeze.

Fran slammed into the coast near Wilmington and kept right on driving, flooding tobacco crops Down East, then pounding through the Carolina Piedmont, into Raleigh and Durham, leaving 22 dead in its wake. Property damage was estimated at $5 billion.

"I can take these things when they skip a few years, but when it's back-to-back like Bertha and Fran and now this, it's pretty hard to take," said Tully Beatty, 30, moments after he nailed the last piece of plywood over the windows of the Underground Sandwich shop in downtown Wilmington. "It's like, what'd we do?"

Just down the road, scaffolding still surrounds the First Baptist Church, which has been under repair since Fran toppled its 100-year-old steeple. Wilmington, in fact, is not the only city in Hanover County that still bears scars from Fran's 115-mph winds.

Joe Boyer, 34, said he cut short a business trip to San Diego to fly home to Wilmington yesterday. But he feared the stores would be closed before he could get the wood for his house.

"I'm sitting here trying to figure out how to make plywood out of a tree," he said just after arriving at Wilmington International Airport. "I have a feeling this is going to be extreme. It's so big."

Yesterday afternoon, Bonnie had already wrecked the wedding of Sophia and Jose Quintanar. They were supposed to be married in "Old Bald," the lighthouse on Bald Head Island.

Ten minutes before they were to take the ferry to the island, it was ordered evacuated.

"Ten minutes!" said Sophia, 35, still dressed in a white wedding gown, a shawl thrown around her neck and a video camera in her hands as they drove around Wilmington in a car with a fake license plate that said, "Just Married -- State of Bliss."

The couple quickly found a bed and breakfast in Southport and got married there. "It was nice," she said. "But it wasn't Old Baldy."

Pub Date: 8/26/98