DERRY, N.H. (AP) – Long lines and packed parking lots greeted voters around the state Tuesday, supporting predictions of record turnout.

Polling places in Keene, Hooksett and at least one ward in Manchester ran out of ballots Tuesday evening, and officials had to run off more or use leftover absentee ballots. Another Manchester ward stayed open late to accommodate voters in line at closing time.

Election officials said the crowds came early, including in Derry, where all the voters in the state’s fourth-largest community vote at the high school gymnasium.

“It’s a zoo,” Town Clerk Marjorie Swanson said Tuesday morning as she handed another 200 ballots to an election official. “We had lines all morning – lines for voting, lines for registration.”

Midmorning is usually the slowest time, but the school’s parking lots were full and 20 people at a time sat at two long tables filling out registration forms.

Secretary of State Bill Gardner predicted last week that a record 600,000 ballots would be cast and that registration, including people signing up Tuesday, would top 800,000.

In Atkinson, traffic backed up for a half-mile in each direction along Route 121 as voters tried to get into the community center parking lot.

Once inside, voters had their minds made up.

In Salem, Pat Sorensen, 50, a registered nurse, said she voted for John Kerry for president because she was so angry with President Bush over the Iraq war.

“I gave him the benefit of the doubt when he said there were weapons of mass destruction and links between Iraq and terrorism,” said Sorensen, an independent. “For months I thought, He must know something I don’t.’ And I’m furious he went to war with disregard for the consequences.”

But another Salem voter, David Keniston, 37, was just as emphatically for Bush. Keniston, who served as a Marine gunner in Afghanistan and Iraq, said Bush is the right leader for the war on terrorism because he’s decisive.

“In my business, if you don’t make decisions, people die,” he said. “It doesn’t have to be the right decision.”

Voting for independent Ralph Nader was Jeff Hartford, 23, a personal trainer voting for president for the first time. He said his vote was basically a protest against Bush and Kerry. “When it comes to politics, I’m not impressed when I hear about what the other one can’t do,” he said. “I want to hear about what they can do.”

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Eds: Associated Press Writer Beverley Wang contributed to this story.

AP-ES-11-02-04 2058EST