Residents were skeptical that Henri would be as damaging as Hurricanes Gloria and Bob, which struck the region in 1985 and 1991.
When it looked like Hurricane Henri would directly hit New England, customers converged on Adler’s Design Center & Hardware in Providence, R.I., where they bought all of the store’s kerosene lamps before moving on to flashlights and candles, said Leanne Dolloff, a cashier. Many longtime residents of the region, however, were skeptical that the storm would be too disruptive. “We’re New Englanders, we can handle it,” said Ms. Dolloff,40, who remembers waking up to a floating bed in her Lowell, Mass., home when Hurricane Gloria — the last hurricane to make landfall on Long Island — swept through in 1985. Officials were preparing in case Henri causes as much damage as Gloria or Hurricane Bob, which tore its way up the East Coast in 1991. More than a dozen people died in each storm. Gloria was a Category 1 storm when it hit Long Island, forcing hundreds of thousands of people to evacuate, bringing down thousands of trees and leaving 1.
