At Least Five Killed In Bahamas By Hurricane Dorian
This GOES-16 satellite image taken Monday, September 2, 2019, at 16:40 UTC and provided by National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), shows Hurricane Dorian, left, churning over The Bahamas. Hurricane Dorian hovered over the Bahamas on Monday, pummeling the islands with a fearsome Category 4 assault that forced even rescue crews to take shelter until the onslaught passes. (NOAA via AP)
NASSAU, Bahamas (AP) — Hurricane Dorian unleashed massive flooding across the Bahamas on Monday, pummelling the islands with so much wind and water that authorities urged people to find floatation devices and grab hammers to break out of their attics if necessary.
At least five deaths were blamed on the storm.
“We are in the midst of a historic tragedy,” Prime Minister Hubert Minnis said in announcing the fatalities.
He called the devastation “unprecedented and extensive.”
The fearsome Category 4 storm slowed almost to a standstill as it shredded roofs, hurled cars and forced even rescue crews to take shelter until the onslaught passed.
Officials said they received a “tremendous” number of calls from people in flooded homes.
A radio station received more than 2,000 distress messages, including reports of a 5-month-old baby stranded on a roof and a grandmother with six grandchildren who cut a hole in a roof to escape rising floodwaters.
Other reports involved a group of eight children and five adults stranded on a highway and two storm shelters that flooded.
The deaths in the Bahamas came after a previous storm-related fatality in Puerto Rico.
At least 21 people were hurt in the Bahamas and evacuated by helicopters, the prime minister said.
Police Chief Samuel Butler urged people to remain calm and share their GPS coordinates, but he said rescue crews had to wait until weather conditions improved.
“We simply cannot get to you,” he told Bahamas radio station ZNS.
Forecasters warned that Dorian could generate a storm surge as high as 23 feet.
Meanwhile, in the United States, the National Hurricane Center extended watches and warnings across the Florida and Georgia coasts.
Forecasters expected Dorian to stay off shore, but meteorologist Daniel Brown cautioned that “only a small deviation” could draw the storm’s dangerous core toward land.
By 5:00 p.m. EDT Monday, the storm’s top sustained winds fell slightly to 145 miles per hour.
It was crawling along Grand Bahama Island at one mile per hour and then remained stationary.