Hurricane Irma Live Updates: Storm Strikes Cuba and Turns Toward Florida Keys
Hurricane Irma Pummels Caribbean and Churns Toward Florida
The Atlantic’s strongest storm has left destruction across the Caribbean. Witnesses warn others to brace themselves as Irma moves toward Florida.
By CAMILLA SCHICK, ROBIN LINDSAY and CHRIS CIRILLO on Publish Date September 6, 2017. Photo by Martin Bureau/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images. Watch in Times Video »
Hurricane Irma churned toward Florida on Saturday, leaving a trail of death and destruction across the Caribbean and prompting one of the largest emergency evacuations in American history.
The storm shifted west, putting the Florida Keys in its cross hairs and prompting officials to open more shelters. By 7 a.m., the outer bands of Irma had begun moving into Miami-Dade County.
“Expect damaging winds and heavy rain,” the National Weather Service warned.
At least 20 people were confirmed dead by Friday night, when Irma made landfall in Cuba as a Category 5, lashing the island’s northern coast with a direct hit.
The hurricane was downgraded to Category 4 around 5 a.m. but was expected to strengthen before reaching Florida. About 5.6 million people — more than a quarter of the state’s population — have been ordered to leave their homes.
“If you have been ordered to evacuate, you need to leave now,” Gov. Rick Scott said at a news conference Friday evening. “Not tonight, not in an hour, now.”
Here’s the latest:
• The National Hurricane Center said that Irma remained “extremely dangerous.” The storm’s outer bands were hitting the Florida Keys on Saturday morning, with winds of 130 m.p.h., and the eye of the storm was expected to hit southwest Florida and Tampa on Sunday. The center warned of “life-threatening surge and wind.” Check out our maps tracking the storm.
Continue reading the main story 
• In addition to the evacuation order in Miami, one of the country’s largest evacuations, an additional 540,000 people were told to leave the Georgia coast. Alabama, North Carolina and South Carolina have declared states of emergency.
• Irma became the first Category 5 hurricane to make landfall in Cuba since 1924.
• Hurricane Jose, upgraded to a Category 4, was barreling toward the Leeward Islands. On St. Martin, already devastated by Irma, Dutch Marines dropped fliers from a helicopter warning inhabitants to head to shelters.
• Hurricane Katia, which made landfall on Mexico’s eastern coast, was downgraded to a tropical storm, with winds of 40 m.p.h.
Sign up for the Morning Briefing for hurricane news and a daily look at what you need to know to begin your day.
Storm makes a direct hit on Cuba.
Hurricane Irma made landfall on Friday night in the Camagüey Archipelago in Cuba. The storm’s trajectory took many by surprise — Cuban meteorologists had not predicted a direct hit.
The eye of the storm, which was upgraded from a Category 4 hurricane, churned through the keys north of the main island at 11 p.m.
The storm not only put residents in peril, it also increased the prospect of economic damage: More than 50 hotels on the keys bring in tourists and much-needed hard currency for Cuba.
Continue reading the main story 
The fastest-growing sector of the island’s economy, tourism has ballooned since the United States and Cuba announced a plan to re-establish diplomatic relations.
Though braced for the worst, there had been a sense that Cuba would escape the scale of damage in other Caribbean islands.
The Esmeraldo Weather Center in Camagüey registered winds of more than 124 miles per hour before part of the weather gauge blew off. State media reported waves more than 16 feet high, and damage to hospitals, factories and warehouses.
Electricity along much of Cuba’s northern coast had been cut since Friday afternoon.
In Punta Alegre, a coastal village in Ciego de Ávila Province, fishermen used nets to tie their wooden houses to the ground. Fishing boats were nestled within thick mangrove to minimize destruction.
At 3 a.m. Saturday, the extent of the damage remained unclear, but state television provided glimpses. A local camera crew in the town of Ciego de Ávila broadcast footage of felled trees and smashed lampposts on the road outside the studio.
Close to one million people were evacuated before the storm hit Cuba. Tens of thousands of tourists were evacuated from resorts, shuttled inland in a convoy of buses flanked by police vehicles. The authorities also evacuated six dolphins by helicopter from a resort on the island of Cayo Guillermo.
The country made other preparations as well. Earlier in the week, the state went into overdrive to harvest rice and fruit early from low-lying areas of Granma Province, in the southeastern part of the island. Cattle were moved to higher ground throughout the country.
Continue reading the main story 
Schools and most businesses were closed in the east and center of the island. Trains, coaches and domestic air services were canceled.
Irma was forecast to move west, approaching the center of Cuba on Saturday evening.
Havana was expected to avoid the brunt of the storm, and the mood in the capital became less strained after meteorologists revised their projections. They now say Irma will cut north earlier than expected. The authorities in Havana are expecting flooding, however.
Residents of the capital have been boiling water, buying candles and stocking up on bread, just in case. — ED AUGUSTIN
Florida Keys brace for storm’s arrival.
With Hurricane Irma heading toward Florida, the situation became dire in the Keys, where officials opened four emergency shelters at the last minute and considered moving emergency workers to another county.
The low-lying Keys are vulnerable to life-threatening winds, dangerous storm surge or both. While the Lower Keys are on track to get a direct hit from the hurricane, the Middle and Upper Keys become more vulnerable to storm surge of five to 10 feet, Monroe County officials said in a statement.
The Friday forecast shifted Irma’s path farther west and predicted a more direct hit for the city of Marathon, Fla., home of the county’s emergency operations center. Officials considered moving south to Key West.
“We evacuated our visitors and have evacuated most of our residents,” the Monroe County administrator, Roman Gastesi, said in the statement. “We continue to try to persuade our residents that remain in the Keys to get out while they still can.”
No comments:
Post a Comment