Hurricane Maria has wrought terrible destruction in the Caribbean, yet OECD guidelines say that the islands are ineligible for assistance • In a manner reminiscent of , dark clouds of despair and destruction hover yet again over the Caribbean with the passage of . The most recent version of our recurring ecological nightmare included followed by , the latter setting a new record of three consecutive days as a category 5 storm with maximum wind speeds of 185mph, and leaving a trail of devastation British foreign secretary Boris Johnson described as “absolutely hellish”.
Unlike those in the US threatened by Harvey, Irma and possibly Maria, there is nowhere to run to on Caribbean islands
Britain's foreign minister Boris Johnson said he was not going to resign, when questioned on Tuesday following reports that he could quit before the weekend if his Brexit demands were not met by Prime Minister Theresa May.
Britain's foreign minister Boris Johnson says he is not going to resign, following reports that he could quit before the weekend if his Brexit demands were not met by Prime Minister Theresa May.
Britain's foreign minister Boris Johnson said he was not going to resign, when questioned on Tuesday (Sept 19) following reports that he could quit before the weekend if his Brexit demands were not met by Prime Minister Theresa May.
Boris Johnson has dismissed suggestions he might resign as British Foreign Secretary and denied the Cabinet is split over Brexit, insisting: "We are a nest of singing birds."
Intense storm – which has now dipped slightly from category five to four – pummels Caribbean and heads to Irma-struck Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico
Puerto Rico’s governor, Ricardo Rosselló, has warned that Maria will have a much greater impact on the island than Hurricane Irma. “It will essentially devastate most of the island,” he warned on USA Today. He added: “It will provoke massive flooding in flooding prone regions ... our priority is to save lives.”
Puerto Rico Gov. on Hurricane Maria preparations
Latest update on Hurricane Maria to our English speaking citizens.
BBC Weather has a useful graphic on the forecast path for Hurricane Maria for the rest of the week.
Likely path of over the next few days. Not looking good for . Tomasz S Maria is a category 4 hurricane on the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Wind Scale. Some fluctuations in intensity are likely during the next day or two, but Maria is forecast to remain an extremely dangerous category 4 or 5 hurricane while it approaches the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico.
Radar imagery from the French Met office shows Hurricane Maria barrelling directly over Dominica before skirting just to the south-west of Gaudeloupe.
L' avec son passage sur la Dominique cette nuit - animation radar de 18h UTC hier à 08h UTC ce matin
À Pointe-à-Pitre, l'ouragan inonde les rues. La surcôte s'additionne aux pluies diluviennes. <(a href="https://t.co/sI9bAOpurY">https://t.co/sI9bAOpurY)
Gus Jaspert, the governor of the British Virgin Islands, says there are frantic efforts to clear the islands of debris left by Hurricane Irma so that it does not “turn into missiles flying at buildings” during Hurricane Maria. Speaking to BBC Radio 4’s Today programme Jaspert explained why he had imposed a curfew until Maria is forecast to hit later on Tuesday and Wednesday.
Clarified our curfew in my latest update: non-essential vehicles must keep off roads from 6pm tonight in , until the all clear is given. This is an absolutely unprecedented event: to have a category five [Irma] followed by another category five [Maria has since dipped to a category 4 hurricane]. In the capital here Road Town, up to about 80% of buildings are destroyed or damaged. It is a huge challenge for us to be able to ensure that people have safe shelter, and that we are prepared and can bounce back quickly. Over the last 11 days or so since Irma, we have been focused on recovery, on rebuilding things, on getting aid out, ensuring security with support of the British military and police who are here. We have switched track ... to preparation and that’s almost our singular message now to the public here. Hurricane Maria is expected to make landfall on the islands on 19 or 20 September. Following the extensive damage caused by Hurricane Irma, there’s a high risk of further severe damage. Coastal flooding is also highly likely. If you’re in the British Virgin Islands you should identify shelter immediately and be ready to take cover when the hurricane approaches. If you’re currently outside the islands, you should not return to the territory at this time.
France’s Met office has published a satellite image showing that French island of Dominca was directly under Maria’s path just before 1am local time. Prime minister, Roosevelt Skerrit, has since said: “We have lost all that money can buy and replace.”
Ouragan vu par le satellite à 00h57 UTC ce 19 sept. Œil de l'ouragan au sud de la .
Maria just skirted to the south of the French overseas territory of Guadeloupe but it still caused powerful winds and near horizontal rain, according to video from those on the island.
Le cyclone vu depuis l'aéroport de Pointe-à-Pitre. Vent et pluie se déchaînent depuis maintenant plus de six heures !
situation à 3h00 à PàP : ça souffle de plus en plus fort, c bizarre ça ne faiblit pas
sainte rose
Britain’s foreign office is , a British overseas territory which Maria is expected to hit later on Tuesday. There are similar warnings against travelling to the British territories of and the which are on Maria’s forecast path for Wednesday and Thursday. There are no reports of damage to hotels or tourist infrastructure on Antigua. The airport is open. Visitors should follow the advice of the local authorities and their tour operators.
Maria is forecast to remain an extremely dangerous category 4 or 5 hurricane while it approaches the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico. On the forecast track, the eye of Maria will move over the northeastern Caribbean Sea today, and approach the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico tonight and Wednesday. You have to evacuate. Otherwise you’re going to die. I don’t know how to make this any clearer.
Guadeloupe will be spared the full brunt of Hurricane Maria, it seems, with the eye of the storm skimming south-west of the island. It will not be spared the eyewall, however, which has been lashing the island with rain and wind gusts of up to 68mph (110kmh), according to the Trinidad and Tobago weather centre.
L'œil de commence à s'éloigner de la en franchissant 62°W mais dangers persistent (pluies intenses, houle, vent).
Hurricane Maria is now hurtling towards islands that escaped the brunt of Irma – including Guadeloupe, Montserrat and St Kitts & Nevis. But it is then forecast to head for the US and British Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico. They are either going to get the wind, which will pick up all the debris that is lying around – and also, irritatingly, where they have made progress in getting covers over the houses and power lines up, it will potentially damage that again. Or they get a huge amount of rain, which is also bad because of the blockages in the drainage channels, so the potential for some quite serious flooding as well.
As well as hurricane-force winds, one of Maria’s most dangerous effects is life-threatening flooding. The US National Hurricane Center predicts the following rainfall as Maria works its way across the Caribbean between now and Thursday:
Next in Maria’s sights is Guadeloupe, where residents were ordered to stay inside from 8pm Monday (it’s currently 2.20am Tuesday there). Winds and rain are already pummelling the French overseas territory, where officials are warning people not to go outside “under any circumstances”.
[Direct] Les vents sont extrêmement violents. Restez confinés. Ne sortez sous aucun prétexte.
This gif shows the direction Maria took as it tracked right across the island of Dominica, with wind speeds of 160mph (260kmh) and flooding rains:
The influence of 's terrain on 's track evident following during passage. Subtle W then NNW bend on island apex.
Roosevelt Skerrit, the prime minister of Dominica, has in which he asks for help for his devastated island: Initial reports are of widespread devastation. So far we have lost all what money can buy and replace. My greatest fear for the morning is that we will wake to news of serious physical injury and possible deaths as a result of likely landslides triggered by persistent rains.
Maria’s wind speeds have dipped slightly – from 160mph (260kmh) as it crossed Dominica to 155mph (250kmh) over the Caribbean Sea now – which means the US National Hurricane Center now labels it a category four storm. But the NHC warns: Maria is forecast to remain an extremely dangerous category 4 or 5 hurricane while it approaches the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico. On the forecast track, the eye of Maria will move over the northeastern Caribbean Sea today, and approach the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico tonight and Wednesday.
The latest advisory from the US National Hurricane Center – at just before 2am in the Caribbean – is that: “Maria remains an extremely dangerous hurricane after moving over Dominica.” Maria is currently passing west-north-west of Dominica, its eye having crossed directly over the island, and is heading towards St Croix in the US Virgin Islands, still reeling from the impact of Hurricane Irma on St Thomas and St John less than two weeks ago.
Roosevelt Skerrit, the prime minister of Dominica, has Caracas-based Telesur TV that rescue teams will head out when dawn breaks on Tuesday (it is currently 1.20am local time). Skerrit said: My greatest fear is that we will wake to news of serious physical injury, possible deaths … Come tomorrow morning we will hit the road in search of the injured and those trapped in the rubble. Winds have swept away the roofs of almost every person I have spoken to or otherwise made contact with.
The eye of Hurricane Maria has stopped weakening as it crosses the Caribbean Sea just south of Guadeloupe:
Hurricane 's eyewall is quickly reorganizing over open water. Now passing just SW of .
As Maria moves away from Dominica, next in its sights are Guadeloupe, a French overseas territory, and Montserrat, a British overseas territory. Press Association has spoken to Carolyne Coleby, a photographer and sheep farmer on Montserrat, as the hurricane began to approach: “It is raining and the winds are picking up – it is going to hit us from the south, which is very serious,” Coleby said, Montserrat escaped the clutches of Hurricane Irma relatively unscathed, but Coleby said people have been told to be “much more worried this time”.
The prime minister of Dominica has used Facebook to describe in harrowing detail – and in real time – his own rescue from the destruction of Hurricane Maria. The category five storm passed directly over the island nation of Dominica on Monday night local time. Amid gusts of wind up to 260kmh (160mph) the country’s long-serving leader, Roosevelt Skerrit, rode out the storm from his home.
It has been a punishing three hours for the 72,000 residents of Dominica – and it is not yet over, warns the Trinidad and Tobago weather centre, which says the outer bands of Hurricane Maria will continue to move over the island overnight, “exacerbating the devastating flooding situation”:
Dominica has experienced at least 3 hours of sustained winds of 260 KM/H with gusts in excess of 315KM/H.
12:20AM Tuesday: Nearly 3 hours after landfall, Category 5 Hurricane Maria's eyewall finally moves off Northeastern Dominica.
The Caribbean-wide response to has been piecemeal and there needs to be a new permanent level of coordination, including better international early warning weather systems, Boris Johnson has said. The British foreign secretary was speaking on Monday at a meeting on the margins of the United Nations general assembly convened by the UK and bringing together British ministers, the French foreign minister Jean-Yves le Drian, the Dutch foreign minister Bert Koenders and leaders from the Caribbean. If I am being totally honest, people have been ringing each other up and saying, ‘what can we do?’. We don’t need a gigantic new bureaucracy but we do need a smooth way to respond to what is obviously going to be an intensifying pattern of horrific weather events in the Caribbean. What we are trying to build here is a Caribbean recovery plan. We need an automatic recovery system.
Mark Brantley, minister of foreign affairs in St Kitts and Nevis, says there is “significant damage” in Dominica, as the storm now heads towards his own islands:
PM Skerritt of has just said the island has been devastated by and asked that we tell the world
Early reports suggest significant damage in from . We pray for more favorable reports at dawn
Radar reports now show the eye of Hurricane Maria leaving Dominica and moving over the sea. Of course, it drags behind it an eyewall, with some hours of strong winds and rains yet to land on the island.
Dominica-based lawyer Anthony Astaphan told Antigua’s Observer Media Group that the wind was “savage”: We lost the roof. My total upstairs, the ceiling and everything collapsed. I have two inches of water downstairs. My god, I can only feel the pain of those who don’t have the house that I have. It was terrible and I just hope people didn’t die.
The US Virgin Islands are bracing themselves for the arrival of Hurricane Maria within 24 hours. Governor Kenneth Mapp urged residents to finish their preparations for shelter and supplies, adding: We are going to have a very, very long night.
Roosevelt Skerrit, the prime minister of Dominica, has been speaking to Caracas-based Telesur TV about the devastation wrought by Maria – the scale of which has yet to be assessed. Skerrit told the station he was rescued from his flooded home by police officers. Please tell the world that Dominica has been devastated … In the morning we will know how many dead there are … We were brutally hit.
What does it feel like to be in the midst of a hurricane? Neuroscientist Dr Daniel Glaser explains: The Saffir-Simpson hurricane scale describes the effects on structures and people, but not what it would feel like. Hearing is the sense most frequently invoked, with winds sounding like a train or a low howl. Of course, the most basic response to these events is fear and awe. Our brain generates the fear and that triggers the gut, which feeds back to the brain. The sensation is really part of an indirect loop. If the hurricane struck your body directly that would be a very different story.
There has been no news of casualties from Dominica so far – but, reports Associated Press, this could be because emergency services are yet to leave shelter: Late Monday, a police official, Inspector Pellam Jno Baptiste, said there were no immediate reports of casualties but it was still too dangerous for officers to do a full assessment as the storm raged outside. “Where we are, we can’t move,” he said in a brief phone interview.
Hurricane warnings remain in effect for:
The latest advisory from the US National Hurricane Center confirms that Maria is moving over Dominica as a category five hurricane. It warns: Hurricane conditions should continue over Dominica during the next few hours. Hurricane conditions should spread throughout portions of the hurricane warning area in the Leeward Islands tonight and early Tuesday. Hurricane conditions should spread through the remainder of the hurricane warning area [which includes the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico] Tuesday and Wednesday. A dangerous storm surge accompanied by large and destructive waves will raise water levels by as much as 7 to 11 feet (2.1m-3.4m) above normal tide levels in the hurricane warning area near where the centre of Maria moves across the Leeward Islands and the British Virgin Islands. The combination of a dangerous storm surge and the tide will cause normally dry areas near the coast to be flooded by rising waters moving inland from the shoreline.
Maria is the first category five hurricane in recorded history to hit Dominica. In 1979, Hurricane David hit the island as a category four storm, the deadliest to date. In all, 56 people died and three-quarters of the population were left homeless.
The US National Hurricane Center has warned that Maria could yet become tense, Associated Press reports: “Maria is developing the dreaded pinhole eye,” the center warned. That’s a sign of an extremely strong hurricane likely to get even mightier, said University of Miami hurricane researcher Brian McNoldy. Just like when a spinning ice skater brings in their arms and rotates faster, a smaller, tighter eye shows the same physics, he said.
Forecasts expect Hurricane Maria to hit Puerto Rico on Tuesday night and Wednesday. On Monday, Hector Pesquera, Puerto Rico’s public safety commissioner, told residents in homes not built to withstand such intense winds to move to shelters: You have to evacuate. Otherwise you’re going to die. I don’t know how to make this any clearer.
Radio station Wice QFM, based in Domica’s capital, Roseau, still appears to be broadcasting. There is a . One caller to the station has been describing “killer winds”.
Dominica’s DBS radio station had been broadcasting news as the hurricane swirled across the island, reporting damage to the roof of the Princess Margaret hospital in the capital, Roseau. Shortly after reporting that something had crashed into the station building, DBS has now gone quiet.
The eye of the hurricane crosses the centre of Dominica – with more strong winds and rainfall to come as the eastern eyewall makes its way across the island:
Eye, dead center, over
While Dominica takes the full force of Hurricane Maria, other islands have already been raked by its outer winds and rains, with yet others still preparing for its arrival, Agence France-Presse reports: Guadeloupe – the bridgehead for aid for Irma-hit French territories – ordered all residents to take shelter in a maximum-level “violet alert” effective from 8pm local time as powerful rains drenched the French Caribbean island. St Kitts and Nevis, the British island of Montserrat, and the islands of Culebra and Vieques were also on alert.
Two years ago, in August 2015, , killing 31 people and destroying more than 370 homes. Many towns were cut off as roads were blocked and power was lost in what was at that point the most devastating storm to lash Dominica since Hurricane David in 1979. Erika had wind speeds of a maximum 50mph (85kmh) – much less than Maria’s 160mph (260kmh).
Jackson says disaster plans are also being put into place for St Kitts and Nevis “as a precaution”.
Ronald Jackson, director of the Caribbean disaster and emergency management agency, says: CARICOM [Caribbean Community] Disaster Relief United being readied for deployment to Dominica at earliest opportunity. Rapid needs and damage assessment teams [are] being readied for deployment to Dominica
In Guadeloupe – which could be the next island to feel Maria’s full force – winds have already picked up speed and the rains are intensifying:
La végétation soumise à rude épreuve !
As Maria approached, Agence France-Presse reported on the islanders making preparations for the catastrophic storm: Residents flocked to supermarkets to stock up on essentials as island officials warned people living in low-lying areas or along rivers to move to high ground. “Just ready to ride out storm at best. With a little prayer on the side,” said school teacher Leandra Lander.
The Trinidad and Tobago weather centre, citing local radio, says the roofs of many buildings “have already been torn off and severe damage has occurred” across Dominica.
The tiny outline overlapped by the eye of Hurricane Maria is Dominica – it has now been swallowed up by the storm’s eyewall, with winds of 160mph (260kph) as it lashes the island.
Eyewall of engulfing most of , including .
Dominica’s prime minister now says he has been rescued – from his roofless home:
Roosevelt Skerrit, the prime minister of Dominica, has posted on his official Facebook page that his “roof is gone” and he is “at the complete mercy of the hurricane”:
Around 70,000 people live in Dominica, the first island struck by Hurricane Maria. Chamberlain Emanuel, head of the environment commission at the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States, warned before landfall: It’s really a desperate situation. We’re trying to be resilient but the vulnerability is just too high.
The US National Hurricane Center forecast predicts that Maria will head west-north-west from Dominica, with islands in its path – Guadeloupe, Montserrat and St Kitts & Nevis most immediately – bracing for winds of up to 160mph (260kph): On the forecast track, the core of Maria will move near Dominica and the adjacent Leeward Islands during the next few hours [Tuesday evening], over the extreme northeastern Caribbean Sea the remainder of tonight and Tuesday, and approach Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands Tuesday night and Wednesday.
Even before Hurricane Maria arrived in full force on Dominica – at around 9pm Monday local time (01.00 Tuesday GMT) – tropical storm-force winds were felling trees and damaging buildings across the island:
earlier today before hurricane-force winds reached them
The following islands – some of them still in the early stages of recovery from Hurricane Irma – are currently on hurricane warnings:
from the US National Hurricane Center warned that Maria has become a “potentially catastrophic category five hurricane … The eye and intense inner core is nearing Dominica”. The eyewall has now barrelled into Dominica’s eastern coast, crossing towards the island’s capital, Roseau, on the south-west side.
Hurricane Maria – which over the course of barely 50 hours has intensified from a tropical storm to a category five hurricane – has hit Dominica, in the eastern Caribbean. The island was spared the wrath of Hurricane Irma, but now faces devastation as it is raked by winds of 160mph (260kph).
830pm: update as landfalls in . Eyewall consolidated possibly by temporary land conv. Distinct jog WNW last hr or so.
Intense storm – which has now dipped slightly from category five to four – pummels Caribbean and heads to Irma-struck Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico
Next in Maria’s sights is Guadeloupe, where residents were ordered to stay inside from 8pm Monday (it’s currently 2.20am Tuesday there). Winds and rain are already pummelling the French overseas territory, where officials are warning people not to go outside “under any circumstances”.
[Direct] Les vents sont extrêmement violents. Restez confinés. Ne sortez sous aucun prétexte.
This gif shows the direction Maria took as it tracked right across the island of Dominica, with wind speeds of 160mph (260kmh) and flooding rains:
The influence of 's terrain on 's track evident following during passage. Subtle W then NNW bend on island apex.
Roosevelt Skerrit, the prime minister of Dominica, has in which he asks for help for his devastated island: Initial reports are of widespread devastation. So far we have lost all what money can buy and replace. My greatest fear for the morning is that we will wake to news of serious physical injury and possible deaths as a result of likely landslides triggered by persistent rains.
Maria’s wind speeds have dipped slightly – from 160mph (260kmh) as it crossed Dominica to 155mph (250kmh) over the Caribbean Sea now – which means the US National Hurricane Center now labels it a category four storm. But the NHC warns: Maria is forecast to remain an extremely dangerous category 4 or 5 hurricane while it approaches the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico. On the forecast track, the eye of Maria will move over the northeastern Caribbean Sea today, and approach the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico tonight and Wednesday.
The latest advisory from the US National Hurricane Center – at just before 2am in the Caribbean – is that: “Maria remains an extremely dangerous hurricane after moving over Dominica.” Maria is currently passing west-north-west of Dominica, its eye having crossed directly over the island, and is heading towards St Croix in the US Virgin Islands, still reeling from the impact of Hurricane Irma on St Thomas and St John less than two weeks ago.
Roosevelt Skerrit, the prime minister of Dominica, has Caracas-based Telesur TV that rescue teams will head out when dawn breaks on Tuesday (it is currently 1.20am local time). Skerrit said: My greatest fear is that we will wake to news of serious physical injury, possible deaths … Come tomorrow morning we will hit the road in search of the injured and those trapped in the rubble. Winds have swept away the roofs of almost every person I have spoken to or otherwise made contact with.
The eye of Hurricane Maria has stopped weakening as it crosses the Caribbean Sea just south of Guadeloupe:
Hurricane 's eyewall is quickly reorganizing over open water. Now passing just SW of .
As Maria moves away from Dominica, next in its sights are Guadeloupe, a French overseas territory, and Montserrat, a British overseas territory. Press Association has spoken to Carolyne Coleby, a photographer and sheep farmer on Montserrat, as the hurricane began to approach: “It is raining and the winds are picking up – it is going to hit us from the south, which is very serious,” Coleby said, Montserrat escaped the clutches of Hurricane Irma relatively unscathed, but Coleby said people have been told to be “much more worried this time”.
The prime minister of Dominica has used Facebook to describe in harrowing detail – and in real time – his own rescue from the destruction of Hurricane Maria. The category five storm passed directly over the island nation of Dominica on Monday night local time. Amid gusts of wind up to 260kmh (160mph) the country’s long-serving leader, Roosevelt Skerrit, rode out the storm from his home.
It has been a punishing three hours for the 72,000 residents of Dominica – and it is not yet over, warns the Trinidad and Tobago weather centre, which says the outer bands of Hurricane Maria will continue to move over the island overnight, “exacerbating the devastating flooding situation”:
Dominica has experienced at least 3 hours of sustained winds of 260 KM/H with gusts in excess of 315KM/H.
12:20AM Tuesday: Nearly 3 hours after landfall, Category 5 Hurricane Maria's eyewall finally moves off Northeastern Dominica.
The Caribbean-wide response to has been piecemeal and there needs to be a new permanent level of coordination, including better international early warning weather systems, Boris Johnson has said. The British foreign secretary was speaking on Monday at a meeting on the margins of the United Nations general assembly convened by the UK and bringing together British ministers, the French foreign minister Jean-Yves le Drian, the Dutch foreign minister Bert Koenders and leaders from the Caribbean. If I am being totally honest, people have been ringing each other up and saying, ‘what can we do?’. We don’t need a gigantic new bureaucracy but we do need a smooth way to respond to what is obviously going to be an intensifying pattern of horrific weather events in the Caribbean. What we are trying to build here is a Caribbean recovery plan. We need an automatic recovery system.
Mark Brantley, minister of foreign affairs in St Kitts and Nevis, says there is “significant damage” in Dominica, as the storm now heads towards his own islands:
PM Skerritt of has just said the island has been devastated by and asked that we tell the world
Early reports suggest significant damage in from . We pray for more favorable reports at dawn
Radar reports now show the eye of Hurricane Maria leaving Dominica and moving over the sea. Of course, it drags behind it an eyewall, with some hours of strong winds and rains yet to land on the island.
Dominica-based lawyer Anthony Astaphan told Antigua’s Observer Media Group that the wind was “savage”: We lost the roof. My total upstairs, the ceiling and everything collapsed. I have two inches of water downstairs. My god, I can only feel the pain of those who don’t have the house that I have. It was terrible and I just hope people didn’t die.
The US Virgin Islands are bracing themselves for the arrival of Hurricane Maria within 24 hours. Governor Kenneth Mapp urged residents to finish their preparations for shelter and supplies, adding: We are going to have a very, very long night.
Roosevelt Skerrit, the prime minister of Dominica, has been speaking to Caracas-based Telesur TV about the devastation wrought by Maria – the scale of which has yet to be assessed. Skerrit told the station he was rescued from his flooded home by police officers. Please tell the world that Dominica has been devastated … In the morning we will know how many dead there are … We were brutally hit.
What does it feel like to be in the midst of a hurricane? Neuroscientist Dr Daniel Glaser explains: The Saffir-Simpson hurricane scale describes the effects on structures and people, but not what it would feel like. Hearing is the sense most frequently invoked, with winds sounding like a train or a low howl. Of course, the most basic response to these events is fear and awe. Our brain generates the fear and that triggers the gut, which feeds back to the brain. The sensation is really part of an indirect loop. If the hurricane struck your body directly that would be a very different story.
There has been no news of casualties from Dominica so far – but, reports Associated Press, this could be because emergency services are yet to leave shelter: Late Monday, a police official, Inspector Pellam Jno Baptiste, said there were no immediate reports of casualties but it was still too dangerous for officers to do a full assessment as the storm raged outside. “Where we are, we can’t move,” he said in a brief phone interview.
Hurricane warnings remain in effect for:
The latest advisory from the US National Hurricane Center confirms that Maria is moving over Dominica as a category five hurricane. It warns: Hurricane conditions should continue over Dominica during the next few hours. Hurricane conditions should spread throughout portions of the hurricane warning area in the Leeward Islands tonight and early Tuesday. Hurricane conditions should spread through the remainder of the hurricane warning area [which includes the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico] Tuesday and Wednesday. A dangerous storm surge accompanied by large and destructive waves will raise water levels by as much as 7 to 11 feet (2.1m-3.4m) above normal tide levels in the hurricane warning area near where the centre of Maria moves across the Leeward Islands and the British Virgin Islands. The combination of a dangerous storm surge and the tide will cause normally dry areas near the coast to be flooded by rising waters moving inland from the shoreline.
Maria is the first category five hurricane in recorded history to hit Dominica. In 1979, Hurricane David hit the island as a category four storm, the deadliest to date. In all, 56 people died and three-quarters of the population were left homeless.
The US National Hurricane Center has warned that Maria could yet become tense, Associated Press reports: “Maria is developing the dreaded pinhole eye,” the center warned. That’s a sign of an extremely strong hurricane likely to get even mightier, said University of Miami hurricane researcher Brian McNoldy. Just like when a spinning ice skater brings in their arms and rotates faster, a smaller, tighter eye shows the same physics, he said.
Forecasts expect Hurricane Maria to hit Puerto Rico on Tuesday night and Wednesday. On Monday, Hector Pesquera, Puerto Rico’s public safety commissioner, told residents in homes not built to withstand such intense winds to move to shelters: You have to evacuate. Otherwise you’re going to die. I don’t know how to make this any clearer.
Radio station Wice QFM, based in Domica’s capital, Roseau, still appears to be broadcasting. There is a . One caller to the station has been describing “killer winds”.
Dominica’s DBS radio station had been broadcasting news as the hurricane swirled across the island, reporting damage to the roof of the Princess Margaret hospital in the capital, Roseau. Shortly after reporting that something had crashed into the station building, DBS has now gone quiet.
The eye of the hurricane crosses the centre of Dominica – with more strong winds and rainfall to come as the eastern eyewall makes its way across the island:
Eye, dead center, over
While Dominica takes the full force of Hurricane Maria, other islands have already been raked by its outer winds and rains, with yet others still preparing for its arrival, Agence France-Presse reports: Guadeloupe – the bridgehead for aid for Irma-hit French territories – ordered all residents to take shelter in a maximum-level “violet alert” effective from 8pm local time as powerful rains drenched the French Caribbean island. St Kitts and Nevis, the British island of Montserrat, and the islands of Culebra and Vieques were also on alert.
Two years ago, in August 2015, , killing 31 people and destroying more than 370 homes. Many towns were cut off as roads were blocked and power was lost in what was at that point the most devastating storm to lash Dominica since Hurricane David in 1979. Erika had wind speeds of a maximum 50mph (85kmh) – much less than Maria’s 160mph (260kmh).
Jackson says disaster plans are also being put into place for St Kitts and Nevis “as a precaution”.
Ronald Jackson, director of the Caribbean disaster and emergency management agency, says: CARICOM [Caribbean Community] Disaster Relief United being readied for deployment to Dominica at earliest opportunity. Rapid needs and damage assessment teams [are] being readied for deployment to Dominica
In Guadeloupe – which could be the next island to feel Maria’s full force – winds have already picked up speed and the rains are intensifying:
La végétation soumise à rude épreuve !
As Maria approached, Agence France-Presse reported on the islanders making preparations for the catastrophic storm: Residents flocked to supermarkets to stock up on essentials as island officials warned people living in low-lying areas or along rivers to move to high ground. “Just ready to ride out storm at best. With a little prayer on the side,” said school teacher Leandra Lander.
The Trinidad and Tobago weather centre, citing local radio, says the roofs of many buildings “have already been torn off and severe damage has occurred” across Dominica.
The tiny outline overlapped by the eye of Hurricane Maria is Dominica – it has now been swallowed up by the storm’s eyewall, with winds of 160mph (260kph) as it lashes the island.
Eyewall of engulfing most of , including .
Dominica’s prime minister now says he has been rescued – from his roofless home:
Roosevelt Skerrit, the prime minister of Dominica, has posted on his official Facebook page that his “roof is gone” and he is “at the complete mercy of the hurricane”:
Around 70,000 people live in Dominica, the first island struck by Hurricane Maria. Chamberlain Emanuel, head of the environment commission at the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States, warned before landfall: It’s really a desperate situation. We’re trying to be resilient but the vulnerability is just too high.
The US National Hurricane Center forecast predicts that Maria will head west-north-west from Dominica, with islands in its path – Guadeloupe, Montserrat and St Kitts & Nevis most immediately – bracing for winds of up to 160mph (260kph): On the forecast track, the core of Maria will move near Dominica and the adjacent Leeward Islands during the next few hours [Tuesday evening], over the extreme northeastern Caribbean Sea the remainder of tonight and Tuesday, and approach Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands Tuesday night and Wednesday.
Even before Hurricane Maria arrived in full force on Dominica – at around 9pm Monday local time (01.00 Tuesday GMT) – tropical storm-force winds were felling trees and damaging buildings across the island:
earlier today before hurricane-force winds reached them
The following islands – some of them still in the early stages of recovery from Hurricane Irma – are currently on hurricane warnings:
from the US National Hurricane Center warned that Maria has become a “potentially catastrophic category five hurricane … The eye and intense inner core is nearing Dominica”. The eyewall has now barrelled into Dominica’s eastern coast, crossing towards the island’s capital, Roseau, on the south-west side.
Hurricane Maria – which over the course of barely 50 hours has intensified from a tropical storm to a category five hurricane – has hit Dominica, in the eastern Caribbean. The island was spared the wrath of Hurricane Irma, but now faces devastation as it is raked by winds of 160mph (260kph).
830pm: update as landfalls in . Eyewall consolidated possibly by temporary land conv. Distinct jog WNW last hr or so.
The United States, Britain, and other countries that are opposed to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad said they would not support the country unless there was also a political transition "away from Assad," according to British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson on Monday at the United Nations General Assembly. The "Friends of Syria" group is an alliance of mostly Western and Gulf Arab countries, who met during the UN General Assembly at a time when the priority of the conflict in Syria seems to be falling behind the North Korean nuclear threat and the future of the Iran nuclear deal. “We believe that the only way forward is to get a political process going and to make it clear to the Iranians,...
