Florida counties under mandatory evacuation orders.
Hurricane Frances continued to weaken and slow down early Friday, but Florida officials took no chances, issuing mandatory evacuations for parts of at least a dozen eastern counties.
The storm -- twice the size of Hurricane Charley, which slammed Florida three weeks ago -- was downgraded from a Category 4 to a Category 3 hurricane late Thursday night, and by 2 a.m. Friday its winds had decreased to 120 mph (192 km/h) from a peak of 145 mph (232 km/h).
"Don't read too much into that because that's still a very dangerous Category Three hurricane on the Saffir-Simpson scale," said Max Mayfield, director of the National Hurricane Center in Miami.
"I think we've finally seen one of these fluctuations that we've been talking about. And we may well gain some of that strength back in the next 24 hours."
