Hurricane Maria makes landfall with Puerto Rico next in line
Storm packing winds of up to 270kph arrives just days after Irma left $1bn trail of destruction
Hurricane Maria, the second maximum-strength storm to tear across the Caribbean this month, struck the US Virgin Island of St Croix yesterday.
It is now headed to Puerto Rico packing catastrophic winds and storm surges.
Maria killed at least one person in Guadeloupe and devastated the tiny island nation of Dominica. The storm came days after the region was hit by Hurricane Irma, which left a US$1 billion (Dh3.67bn) trail of destruction in the area.
The hurricane, a rare Category 5 storm at the top end of the five-step Saffir-Simpson scale, was carrying sustained winds of 270kph with higher gusts, the US national hurricane centre reported.
It was about 32 kilometres south-west of St Croix at 9am (UAE time) yesterday and its outer eyewall was lashing the island with winds of about 145kph, the NHC said.
Maria was predicted to be the worst storm to hit St Croix, home to about half of the US Virgin Islands’ 103,000 residents, since Hugo, a Category 4 storm, in 1989.
Many US Virgin Islands residents had fled to shelters by midday on Tuesday.
Kenneth Mapp, the US Virgin Islands governor, warned residents that their lives were at risk.
“You lose your life the moment you start thinking about how to save a few bucks to stop something from crashing or burning or falling apart,” he said.
“The only thing that matters is the safety of your family, and your children, and yourself. The rest of the stuff, forget it.”
Hector Cintron, who works at a telephone company on St Thomas, said he had spent the past couple of days preparing generators, securing his belongings and clearing debris as he and his neighbors prepared for a repeat of Irma.
“There’s a lot of stress and a lot of anxiety. It’s off the charts,” he said.
Maria was expected to cross Puerto Rico yesterday and pass just north of the north-east coast of the Dominican Republic last night and today, the NHC said.
It was too early to know if Maria will threaten the continental United States as it moves northward in the Atlantic.
This month, Hurricane Irma devastated several small islands, including Barbuda and the US Virgin Islands of St Thomas and St John, and caused heavy damage in Cuba and Florida, killing at least 84 people in the Caribbean and the US mainland.
Maria was set to be the strongest hurricane to hit Puerto Rico in nearly 90 years, probably a Category 4 or 5 when it makes landfall, the NHC said. A slow weakening is expected after the hurricane emerges over the Atlantic north of Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic, it said.
In Puerto Rico, Maria is expected to dump more than 600 millimetres of rain on parts of the island and bring storm surges – when hurricanes push ocean water dangerously over normal levels – of up to 2.74 metres, the NHC said.
The heavy rainfall could cause life-threatening flash floods and mudslides.
“We have not experienced an event of this magnitude in our modern history,” Ricardo Rossello, governor of Puerto Rico said on Tuesday.
“Although it looks like a direct hit with major damage to Puerto Rico is inevitable, I ask for America’s prayers,” he said.
Puerto Rico, a US territory of about 3.4 million people, avoided much of Irma’s destructive force, but the storm knocked out power for 70 per cent of the island, and killed at least three people. Maria threatens to be worse, but the government said it had set up 500 shelters.
“This is going to be catastrophic for our island,” said Grisele Cruz, who was staying at a shelter in the south-east city of Guayama. “We’re going to be without services for a long time.”
About 150 flights were canceled at the main international airport in Puerto Rico yesterday, according to tracking service FlightAware.com.
US airlines said on Tuesday they would cap one-way fares at US$99 (Dh363) to $384 to aid evacuations.
The storm ploughed into Dominica, a mountainous country of 72,000 people, late on Monday, causing what prime minister Roosevelt Skerrit called “mind-boggling” destruction.
“The winds have swept away the roofs of almost every person I have spoken to or otherwise made contact with,” Mr Skerrit said, noting that his own residence had been hit too.
He said he was now focused on rescuing people who might be trapped and getting medical help for the injured.
Maria was set to be the strongest hurricane to hit Puerto Rico in nearly 90 years, probably a Category 4 or 5