Hurricane Sandy strengthened early Monday, packing 85-mile-an-hour winds as it churned up the Atlantic coast and was expected to make landfall late Monday, unleashing life-threatening storm surges along the Eastern Seaboard.
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Getty Images In this NASA satellite image, Hurricane Sandy churns off the U.S. East Coast as it moves north in the Atlantic Ocean Sunday.
Sandy triggered evacuation orders for hundreds of thousands of residents, the cancellation of nearly 8,000 airline flights, the mass closure of schools and public transit systems and the closure of U.S. stock and options markets.
The latest storm projection map by the National Weather Service indicated the Category 1 hurricane would make landfall between Delaware and New Jersey, but forecasters have warned the large, slow-moving storm will deliver gale-force winds, rain, flooding and even snow across a much broader swath stretching from North Carolina to New England.
Sandy was located about 285 miles east of Cape Hatteras, N.C., and about 385 miles south-southeast of New York City at 5 a.m. EDT, moving north at about 15 miles an hour, according to the weather service.
Tropical storm conditions were already occurring Monday over parts of the mid-Atlantic states from North Carolina to Long Island in New York state, with hurricane-force winds expected to arrive in areas including New York City later in the day. Forecasters warned winds on the upper floors of high-rise buildings will be significantly stronger than at ground level.
Hurricane-force winds are expected along portions of the coast from Chincoteague, Virginia and Chatham, Massachusetts.
WSJ's Wendy Bounds and the Journal's contributing meteorologist Eric Holthaus discuss the magnitude of Hurricane Sandy. Also, WSJ reporters and editors are tracking Sandy's impact on video up and down the east coast. AP Photo.
U.S. stock and options markets will close Monday, exchanges and regulators said, the first unscheduled, market-wide shutdown since September 2001. Markets may remain closed Tuesday, exchange officials and traders said. An earlier plan to only close floor trading was deemed too complicated, people with knowledge of the matter said. Other investors said half-empty trading desks and thin trading volume could have made the market susceptible to swings.
The Category 1 hurricane was forecast to drop 8 inches of rain on northeastern North Carolina and up to a foot in parts of the mid-Atlantic states over the next few days. Forecasters described a storm footprint expected to stretch from Washington, D.C., north to Philadelphia, New York City and Boston. The National Weather Service said two cold fronts, one west of Hurricane Sandy and another north, were drawing the warm-air hurricane toward the populous coast and expected to fortify Sandy's reach and intensity.
Compare Sandy With Irene
Experts say Hurricane Sandy is wider and stronger than Hurricane Irene, which caused more than $15 billion in damage in 2011, and could rival the worst East Coast storm on record.
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The unusual weather confluence will turn Sandy into a post-tropical cyclone, or nor'easter, unleashing record low-pressure readings and wind gusts to 70 miles an hour as far inland as western Pennsylvania and western New York, the National Weather Service said.
Under normal conditions, similar tropical storms would be expected to drift east and dissipate over the Atlantic. Instead, Sandy could make landfall anywhere from the Delmarva Peninsula to Long Island. Authorities late Sunday expected the storm to strike in southern New Jersey.
New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie warned residents along the coast: "Don't be stupid. Get out and go to higher, safer ground."
Thousands of New Jersey residents started Monday without power. Jersey Central Power & Light reported nearly 5,000 homes and businesses were without service early Monday, the Associated Press reported.
The National Weather Service said Sandy's hurricane-force winds could bring power outages for millions of residents. Dominion Power, which provides electricity in both Virginia and North Carolina, reported Sunday that 2,524 homes and businesses were without power.
New York officials closed down public transit Sunday evening, a bus- and rail-system that normally ferries about 8.5 million passengers a day during the workweek. New York city schools, which serve more than a million students, also were ordered shut until the storm cleared. New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg told an estimated 375,000 residents to leave flood-prone neighborhoods in Brooklyn and Manhattan.
Amtrak canceled all Northeast Corridor and Keystone Service route trains on Monday, as well as other inland routes along the East Coast. New Jersey, Philadelphia and Washington also shut down local transit systems.
The storm interrupted the campaigns of President Barack Obama and Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, with the election a little more than a week away. Mr. Romney canceled campaign stops in Virginia and New Hampshire. Mr. Obama canceled his campaign event Monday in Florida with former President Bill Clinton. The campaign already canceled events Monday in Ohio and Virginia, as well as a Tuesday trip to Colorado.
Federal government offices in the Washington area will be closed Monday to the public, the Office of Personnel Management said Sunday. The forecast in the region called for 35- to 40-mile per hour winds Monday, along with five to 10 inches of rain.
Hurricane Sandy has already begun disrupting business, with many companies planning to close Monday. Google Inc. canceled a major event in Manhattan at which it was expected to promote a new mobile phone and a rumored redesign of its Nexus tablet. Citibank closed branches in flood-prone parts of New York City, waiving fees for its customers who use the ATMs of competing banks.
Temperatures could drop below 30 degrees in coming days across the eastern U.S., bringing further misery to those without power. West Virginia, Kentucky and other states could get up to three feet of snow in mountain areas.
Connecticut Gov. Dannel Malloy urged residents along the state's coastline to heed evacuation warnings. "It appears as the worst case scenario for Connecticut is the most likely one to play itself out in the coming days," he said. "We are talking about extensive flooding, maybe the worst that we've seen in 70 years."
Once ashore, Sandy could trigger storm surges of six to 11 feet in Long Island Sound, Raritan Bay and New York harbor, as well as extensive flooding many miles inland, the National Weather Service said. Such surges in the New York area "would be record levels," said Howard Glaser, director of state operations for New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo.
Reuters Utility workers stack sandbags in Lower Manhattan to protect the electric grid from Sandy's expected storm surge.
"I know that we get accustomed to hearing weather forecasts and sometimes we're dubious about the weather forecasts, but this is nothing to play with, and this is nothing to take lightly, so take this seriously," Mr. Cuomo said. "In a situation like this, you prepare for the worst and hope for the best."
Elsewhere, storm surges could reach six feet in parts of North Carolina, four feet in Virginia's Chesapeake Bay and six feet in Cape Cod, the weather service said. At the Norfolk Naval base, the U.S. Navy's Atlanta fleet moved ships off shore for safety.
As the forecasts for Sandy grew over the weekend, residents in North Carolina to Maine boarded up houses, tied up boats and belongings, and stocked up on food and batteries. In Norfolk, Va., some drivers showed up at gas stations before dawn Sunday to fill their tanks.
Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley predicted several days of power outages and announced that early voting planned for Monday would be rescheduled. Baltimore city officials set up shelters and gave away sandbags to residents who live near the water.
"This is a serious, killer storm," Mr. O'Malley said. "It will likely take more lives as it hits the mid-Atlantic."
Tourists in Atlantic City, N.J., placed their last few bets Sunday morning before gambling was shut down and casinos evacuated.
Many of Atlantic City's 40,000 residents appeared to be following Mr. Christie's advice. Plywood covered the windows at Mel's Furniture Factory Direct Bedding on Atlantic Avenue, with the message "GO AWAY SANDY" in spray paint. Jamal English said he was picking up his grandchildren, who were staying at a hotel with their mother, and leaving town.
"A lot of people are staying," he said. "It's crazy, but they just don't know. I was born and raised here, so I know how this weather is, and it's going to get bad."
In Rehoboth Beach, Delaware on Sunday afternoon, Lakhi Nainani boarded up his jewelry shop, Touch of Class. The 69-year-old man and his brother, who owns a sports shop next door, said this was only the second time they have had to board up their windows in 21 years on the boardwalk. "I'm worried," Mr. Nainani said, "but what can you do? It's Mother Nature."
—Cameron McWhirter, Reed Albergotti, Jamila Trindle, Will James, Michael Howard Saul, Joseph De Avila, Heather Haddon, Michael R. Crittenden, Sudeep Reddy and Peter Loftus contributed to this article. 
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