Trump says Puerto Rico ‘absolutely obliterated’
The president declared Puerto Rico a disaster area, freeing up federal relief after Hurricane Maria hit with Category 3 winds. The full extent of the destruction is still unknown because much of the island is without power or communication, and many parts still are inaccessible. Story,
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico — Puerto Rico, already inundated with heavy rains unleashed by Hurricane Maria, braced itself for several more inches of rain and possible flash floods while wide swaths of the island remained without power.
As the strongest hurricane to hit the island in generations continued to barrel through the Caribbean on Thursday, the full extent of the damage in Puerto Rico remained unclear, as dozens of municipalities had lost all communication. Even so, officials on the island said recovery efforts would begin promptly.
On Thursday, ahead of a meeting at the U.N. General Assembly in New York, President Donald Trump described Puerto Rico as “absolutely obliterated.”
Trump said he’s working with Puerto Rico Gov. Ricardo Rossello on recovery efforts.
“All you have to do is read or turn on the television and you will see a place that is practically leveled,” Trump said. “It’s incredible the power of that wind.”
Trump signed a federal disaster declaration for the island of 3.4 million people.
Mike Brennan, a specialist at the National Hurricane Center in Miami, said the storm was expected to dump 4 to 8 inches of additional rain and up to 35 inches in isolated spots on the island Thursday.
On Wednesday, some people walked through chest-high brown water to safety.
“We’re still seeing heavy rainfall occurring over Puerto Rico,” Brennan said in a video posted on Twitter.
Flash-flood alerts sounded all day in the capital of San Juan, which saw spotty rain.
Jenniffer Gonzalez-Colon, Puerto Rico’s representative in the U.S. Congress, said rescue efforts are ongoing.
“Some families have been rescued, others still need help,” she said Thursday on CNN. “A lot of the communications towers are off line, so people on the mainland trying to call families and friends here on the island should know that we don’t have communications in so many areas. That’s the main problem right now.”
Off Puerto Rico, two children and their mother were rescued after a boat hit 20-foot seas — but the children’s father was found dead, searchers said Thursday.
Aboard the boat, called Ferrel, were a Dominican woman and a British man and their two children, both age 12. It’s unclear where their journey began.
They sent out an emergency position alert Wednesday as Hurricane Maria was bearing down on the island, according to the Coast Guard. It was followed by a distress call saying the boat was disabled in high seas and 115 mph winds, near Vieques, an island off eastern Puerto Rico.
The Coast Guard spotted the overturned boat with the two children and mother on top,officials said.
The woman and her two children were placed on the U.S.S. Kearsarge. The man was found dead underneath the capsized boat, according to the Coast Guard.
A mix of aircraft and boats from the Coast Guard, the U.S. Navy and British Royal Navy were involved in the search.
Information about where the Ferrel is from and the name of the people who were aboard was not immediately available.
Airports in San Juan, Aguadilla and Ponce were closed, and a curfew from 6 p.m. to 6 a.m. remained in effect for the island.
Maria, which on Thursday was a Category 3 storm, was expected to approach the Turks and Caicos Islands and the southeastern Bahamas early today, according to the National Hurricane Center.
For several days, Maria has pummeled the Caribbean, leaving a deadly path.
Roosevelt Skerrit, the prime minister of Dominica, said at least 15 people are dead and 20 missing after Maria made landfall there earlier in the week.
In the oceanfront settlement of La Perla,
homes were roofless, stripped bare by powerful winds that lashed the shanties clustered above a narrow strip of beach.
Down the hill, neighbors were clearing the main road. Men pushed aside stalled cars and examined ruptured water pipes as women tucked back downed power lines.
The damage was
A parking garage had collapsed on several cars. Restaurants were blocked by debris.
Thousands in Puerto Rico have been living without power since Hurricane Irma struck earlier this month.
Rossello said Maria was the “most devastating storm to hit the island this century, if not in modern history.”
The island’s energy grid took such a severe blow from Maria that restoring power to everyone may take months, he told CNN.
The U.S. territory has been through a long recession and is deeply in debt and has a state-owned power grid that is “a little bit old, mishandled and weak,” Rossello told CNN. overwhelming.
Staff writer Adam Sacasa contributed to this report. Staff writer Kurtis Lee reported from Los Angeles.