Hurricane Dorian, one of the most powerful Atlantic hurricanes on record, showed some signs of weakening early on Tuesday as it remained stalled over Grand Bahama Island, the Miami-based National Hurricane Center (NHC) said.
Dorian has been pounding the Bahamas for days, killing at least five people in the Abaco Islands in the northern Bahamas and inundating homes with floodwater ahead of its expected advance on the U.S. coast, where more than a million people have been ordered evacuated.
But the hurricane has weakened to a Category 3 on the five-step Saffir-Simpson Wind Scale with maximum sustained winds of 130 miles per hour (215 kph), the NHC said early on Tuesday. It is expected to stay put until at least later in the morning.
The exact toll of the devastation in the Bahamas will not be clear until the storm passes and rescue crews can get on the ground.
“We are in the midst of a historic tragedy in parts of our northern Bahamas,” Bahamian Prime Minister Hubert Minnis told a news conference on Monday. “Our mission and focus now is search, rescue and recovery.”
He added that the U.S. Coast Guard was on the ground in Abaco and had rescued a number of injured individuals. Critically injured people were being taken to hospitals on New Providence, the country’s most populous island.
As many as 13,000 homes in the Bahamas may have been destroyed or severely damaged, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies said.
Houses in a neighborhood in Freeport on Grand Bahama Island were engulfed by 6 feet (1.8 m) of water. “It looks like they’re boats on top of the water,” said Rosa Knowles-Bain, 61, a resident who fled two days ago to an emergency shelter.
Dorian was expected to drift to the northwest late on Tuesday and stalk the coasts of Florida, South Carolina and Georgia, it said.
Forecasters have told Floridians not to become complacent, as the storm is now predicted to stay off the coast.
“It’s not that far off shore,” said Robbie Berg, a forecaster and hurricane specialist with the NHC.
“All it has to do is jog a little bit west and you have a full-on hurricane rolling through Florida,” he said. “No one is out of the woods.”
EVACUATIONS
Nine counties in Florida have issued mandatory evacuations. They included parts of Duval County, home to Jacksonville, one of Florida’s two biggest cities, and some areas in Palm Beach County, home to Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis urged coastal residents to heed evacuation orders.
Among those being evacuated was Sue Watson, a 93-year-old resident of a retirement community in Kissimmee in central Florida.
“I was all set to stay home until they had to turn the water off,” said Watson, who added she was not worried for her personal safety but hoped the storm spared the retirement community.
The storm was causing havoc for travelers on Florida’s east coast, where some airports and gasoline stations were closed.
Orlando International Airport, one of the largest in the state, planned to cease commercial operations at 2 a.m. on Tuesday because of the storm, it said in a statement.
Walt Disney World Resort in Orlando will close early on Tuesday, it said in a statement. (Reuters)
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