Travel

Hurricane Beryl Lashes the Caribbean as a Category 4 Storm

Hurricane Beryl made landfall on Grenada’s Carriacou Island on Monday morning as an “extremely dangerous” Category 4 hurricane, and brought life-threatening winds and storm surges to islands across the Caribbean.

  • Officials in Grenada reported widespread destruction across the country’s three main islands, including Carriacou and Petite Martinique, where the electric grid was down. There were also reports on Monday of extensive storm surge and damaged buildings, including at least one main hospital.

  • The storm surge accompanying Beryl is expected to raise water levels by up to nine feet near where it makes landfall. Flash flooding is also a concern as the storm brings three to six inches of rain.

  • By next weekend, the storm could make it into the Gulf of Mexico, but it is “too soon” to discuss what happens if and when it does, forecasters said Monday morning.

When Beryl developed into a Category 4 hurricane on Sunday, it was the earliest in a season that a storm had reached such strength. The earliest Category 4 hurricane on record had been Hurricane Dennis on July 8, 2005.

Beryl, the first hurricane of the 2024 season, was downgraded slightly early Monday but strengthened again to a Category 4 storm, with maximum sustained winds near 150 miles per hour, according to the National Hurricane Center.

A hurricane warning remains in effect for Barbados, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Grenada and the island of Tobago. Martinique and St. Lucia are under a tropical storm warning, while parts of Haiti and the Dominican Republic are under a tropical storm watch. A hurricane watch is in effect for Jamaica, where hurricane conditions are possible by Wednesday, the center said.

Officials in Barbados said Monday morning that the island had been spared from the worst of the hurricane, which passed close to the southern tip of the country.

Hurricanes in the Atlantic Ocean have become more likely to grow from a weak storm into a major Category 3 or higher hurricane within just 24 hours, according to a study published last year.

Devastating winds from Beryl will occur where the eye wall, the area that surrounds the eye of a hurricane, scrapes across the islands. Across the higher elevations of the hills and mountains of the islands, the winds might be even stronger.

Beryl is the third earliest major hurricane to ever form in the Atlantic, according to Philip Klotzbach, an expert in seasonal hurricane forecasts at Colorado State University. The only hurricanes to have formed earlier in a calendar year were Alma on June 8, 1966, and Audrey on June 27, 1957. Both made landfall on the U.S. coastline in the Gulf of Mexico: Alma near St. Marks, Fla., and Audrey near Port Arthur, Texas.

Beryl became a tropical storm late on Friday when its sustained winds reached 39 miles per hour. At 74 m.p.h., a storm becomes a hurricane.

Prime Minister Dickon Mitchell of Grenada said late Monday morning that the islands of Carriacou and Petite Martinique were bearing the brunt of Hurricane Beryl.

“The expectation is that the damage in Carriacou and Petite Martinique is going to be extreme,” he said in a briefing streamed on Facebook.

There was no electricity on any of Grenada’s islands on Monday morning and communication was difficult.

Mr. Dickon said that there have been reports of extensive storm surge, losses of roofs and widespread damage to buildings. In Grenada, even before the hurricane made landfall, the roof of one police station had blown off. The roof of a hospital was also damaged and patients were evacuated to the lower level, Mr. Dickon said.

Officials said they hoped to begin damage assessment and recovery operations by late evening.

In Barbados, officials said they appeared to have avoided the worst effects of Beryl.

There were no overnight reports of injuries, Wilfred Abrahams, the minister of home affairs and information, said during on a broadcast from the emergency operations center in a daybreak broadcast.

“We dodged a bullet,” he said. “Or we’re in the process of dodging a bullet, but there is still a lot of weather to come.”

After Beryl passes through the eastern Caribbean Islands on Monday, it is expected to continue pushing west over the central Caribbean, skirting just south of Jamaica in the middle of the week and into the Yucatán Peninsula by the weekend. There is some indication that the hurricane may weaken over the central Caribbean.

Forecasters have warned that the 2024 Atlantic hurricane season could be much more active than usual.

In late May, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration predicted 17 to 25 named storms this year, an “above-normal” number and a prediction in line with more than a dozen forecasts earlier in the year from experts at universities, private companies and government agencies. Hurricane seasons produce 14 named storms, on average.

Johnny Diaz, John Yoon, John Keefe, Mike Ives, Kenton X. Chance, Julius Gittens, Remy Tumin, Sharefil Gaillard, Linda Straker and Yan Zhuang contributed reporting.


Source link

Related Articles