Islands will be ‘destroyed’ by hurricane, expert predicts

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — Wielding the most powerful winds ever recorded for a storm in the Atlantic Ocean, Hurricane Irma bore down Tuesday on the Leeward Islands of the northeast Caribbean.

The storm, a dangerous Category 5, posed an immediate threat to the small islands of the northern Leewards, including Antigua and Barbuda, as well as the British and U.S. Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico.

"The Leeward Islands are going to get destroyed," warned Colorado State University meteorology professor Phil Klotzbach, a noted hurricane expert. "I just pray that this thing wobbles and misses them. This is a serious storm."

Irma had maximum sustained winds of 300 km/h in late afternoon as it approached the Caribbean from the east, according to the U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami.

Four other storms have had winds that strong in the overall Atlantic region but they were in the Caribbean Sea or the Gulf of Mexico, which are usually home to warmer waters that fuel cyclones.

Irma is so strong because of the unusually warm waters for that part of the Atlantic.

Hurricane-force winds extended outward up to 95 kilometres from the centre and tropical storm-force winds extended outward up to 280 km.

The centre of Irma was about 210 km east of Antigua and about 220 km east-southeast of Barbuda, prompting an ominous warning from officials as the airport closed.

People in the two-island nation should seek protection from Irma’s “onslaught,” officials warned in a statement, closing with: “May God protect us all.”

Several small islands were directly in the path of the storm. In addition to Barbuda they included Anguilla, a small, low-lying British territory of about 15,000 people.

Authorities there converted three churches and a school into shelters.

“People normally go to friends and family during a storm. We’ll see,” said Melissa Meade, director of the Disaster Management Department. “We’ll find out soon enough.”

The storm's eye was expected to pass about 80 km from Puerto Rico late today.

“Puerto Rico has not seen a hurricane of this magnitude in almost 100 years,” Carlos Anselmi, a meteorologist in San Juan, said.

For the Caribbean “even if the eyewall doesn’t pass directly over them, which unfortunately it’s going to do in the northern Leewards,” it will be big enough and close enough to cause nasty storm surge, heavy rain with mudslides,” said University of Miami senior hurricane researcher Brian McNoldy

Authorities warned the storm could dump up to 31 centimetres of rain, cause landslides and flash floods, and generate waves of up to seven metres. Government officials urged people to finalize all preparations as store shelves emptied out.