Bermuda breathed a sigh of relief after Hurricane Nate passed 107 miles to the island?s south at noon yesterday.

The Category One Hurricane, packing winds of 86 m.p.h to 103 m.p.h., was located 132 nautical miles south of Bermuda at 6 a.m. yesterday

Khamla Smith of the Bermuda Weather Service said amid yesterday?s blustery conditions, the highest recorded gust at the airport was less than 50 miles per hour.

?We were lucky. We definitely didn?t get the worst case scenario with this storm,? Ms Smith said.

?But we did hear rumours of higher gusts of 50 knots in Dockyard.?

Ms Smith said heavy rains fell from the storm with 0.75 inches recorded in just one very heavy shower.

Strong winds cancelled seven flights at the Bermuda International Airport and high seas took a St. George?s ferry out of service yesterday morning.

Airport General Manager James Howes said the airport stayed open yesterday but American Airlines cancelled its New York flights and Air Canada cancelled its flight to Toronto.

US Airways cancelled flights to four US cities ? Philadelphia, New York, Washington D.C. and Boston.

?There were no cancellations by Continental, Delta, and British Airways, who operated all of their scheduled flights today,? Mr. Howes said.

Rush hour traffic was slowed coming into Hamilton, but all Government offices were open and schools started the first day of the school year.

Near the height of the storm, the Bermuda Weather Service reported squalls of 52 miles per hour with seas inside the reef at six to nine feet and outside at 15 to 20 feet.

The Bermuda Electric Light Company (Belco) said three circuits were affected by the hurricane resulting in outages.

Two hundred customers in the Berkeley Road/Admiralty area were out from 1.43 a.m to 2.50 a.m., Belco said, while 192 customers at Stokes Point, St. David?s were without power from 10.46 a.m. to 11.55 a.m. And 20 Devon Springs customers were affected from 9.46 a.m. to 11.08 a.m., it said.

?In addition, there were a few isolated calls during the morning which were all restored by approximately 1 p.m. They include Spring Hill, Warwick ? where a transformer needed to be replaced,? s company spokeswoman said.

?Wellman Lane, Southampton, Whaling Hill, Southampton and Ord Road, Warwick, experienced outages caused by tree damage to overhead lines, affecting in total approximately 30 customers.?

The Weather Service said Hurricane Nate is not likely to return. ?It is not impossible, but all the models agree it will move to the north-east,? Ms Smith said. The Island was on a Hurricane Watch for less than 24 hours, with the alert being lifted at 5.30 a.m. yesterday, she said.

But the Emergency Measures Organisation (EMO) ? made up of Government, utilities and private agencies ? announced it would continue to monitor Hurricane Nate until it was assured Nate had passed out of reach.

?The Island will continue to experience tropical storm force wind and rain effects of Hurricane Nate as the system passes the Island later this afternoon,? it said yesterday in a release.

?All Government services, including public transportation are on their normal schedule today, however, the Department of Marine and Ports Services confirmed this morning that due to current weather conditions, ferry service to St. George?s was suspended.

?Marine and Ports noted that they will be monitoring the weather throughout the day as it relates to afternoon commuter service, and update the public accordingly,? it said.

And the EMO said it would continue to monitor the storm?s track until it is assured Nate has passed Bermuda.

The Bermuda Police Service reported no storm related incidents yesterday.