Washington, Aug 23.- Hurricane Lane is threatening a direct hit on Hawaii and could become the most powerful storm to reach the archipelago in a quarter of a century.
Schools, governments and businesses have closed while residents stocked up on food, water and other supplies and boarded up homes.
The hurricane, classified as a powerful Category 4 storm, was packing sustained winds of up to 145mph (230 km/h) and could dump as much as 20inches of rain over parts of the US Pacific island state, triggering flash flooding and landslides, the National Weather Service (NWS) warned.