Caribbean islands prepare for another battering

CARIBBEAN: The fourth major Atlantic hurricane of the year, Maria, strengthened into a rare Category 5 storm, as it churned through the eastern Caribbean, bearing down on the tiny island nation of Dominica while on a likely collision course with the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico.

Maria was upgraded as its maximum sustained winds reached 215kmh, with higher gusts, the United States National Hurricane Centre (NHC) reported.

The centre of the storm, described by the NHC as ‘‘potentially catastrophic’’, was on a track that would put it over Puerto Rico by tomorrow, according to the agency’s latest bulletins.

Dominica, a heavily forested former British colony home to 72,000 people, lies in the eastern Caribbean about halfway between the French islands of Guadeloupe, to the north, and Martinique, to the south.

Maria would be the most powerful hurricane to hit Puerto Rico in 85 years, since a Category 4 storm swept the US island territory in 1932, Hurricane Centre spokesman Dennis Feltgen said. The last major hurricane to strike Puerto Rico directly was Georges, which made landfall there as a Category 3 storm, he said.

The governor of Puerto Rico, Ricardo Rossello, urged island residents to brace for the storm’s arrival, saying, ‘‘It is time to seek refuge with a family member, friend or head to a state shelter’’.

Puerto Rico narrowly avoided a direct hit two weeks ago from Hurricane Irma, which reached a Category 5 status and ranked as the most powerful Atlantic storm on record before devastating several smaller islands, including the US Virgin Islands of St Thomas and St John. Residents of some islands fled in advance of the storm.

US Virgin Islands Governor Kenneth Mapp said Maria was due to pass within 16km of the island of St Croix, which escaped the brunt of Irma’s Category 5-force fury on September 6 and is home to about 55,000 year-round residents, roughly half of the entire territory’s population.

The territory’s two other main islands, St Thomas and St John, which lie to the north of St Croix, sustained widespread heavy damage from Irma. – Reuters