Hurricane Beryl, which threatens the Caribbean, has strengthened again and was upgraded to a “potentially catastrophic” Category 5 by the US National Hurricane Center (NHC) late Monday after sweeping through several islands in the southeastern Caribbean.
“Beryl is now a potentially catastrophic Category 5 hurricane” and “is still expected to be close to major hurricane intensity” with winds of up to 260 km/h, as it continues on its path to Jamaica, which it is expected to reach on Wednesday, the NHC said in a bulletin issued at 11:00 p.m. local time (0300 GMT).
Before being upgraded to Category 5, the hurricane had already hit the island of Grenada in the Antilles on Monday, with “devastating” winds of up to 240 km/h, according to the same source, a rare phenomenon so early in the season.
“The eye of Beryl hit the island of Carriacou” in the south of the Antilles at 11:10 local time (15:10 GMT), declared the American agency, which had called on residents to “act immediately” to protect themselves.
“In half an hour, Carriacou was flattened,” Grenadian Prime Minister Dickon Mitchell said at a press conference on Monday, adding that he could not say “with certainty that no one was injured or killed as a result of the hurricane.”
A curfew has been declared in the country from 7 p.m. to 7 a.m. on Tuesday.
– “Earliest” hurricane –
Videos obtained by AFP from St. George’s, the capital of Grenada, showed torrential rain and strong winds.
US President Joe Biden and his team said Monday that they were “closely monitoring the progress of Hurricane Beryl” and working “to ensure the safety of all American citizens in the region.”
Beryl is the first hurricane of the season in the Atlantic. A weather event of this scale is extremely rare so early in the hurricane season – which runs from early June to late November in the United States.
“Only five major hurricanes (of force 3 or greater) have been recorded in the Atlantic before the first week of July,” hurricane expert Michael Lowry told X. By becoming the sixth, Beryl is also “the earliest of those ever recorded this far east.”
Before hitting Grenada, strong winds had swept through Barbados, where gas stations were stormed by motorists stocking up on petrol.
Supermarkets and small grocery stores were crowded with shoppers stocking up on water, food and other necessities. Everywhere, the same scene of residents nailing boards to their windows to protect them.
After Beryl’s passage, Barbados appears to have “had a lucky escape,” Home Affairs and Information Minister Wilfred Abrahams said in a video.
As of 2100 GMT Monday, Jamaica was on hurricane watch, according to the NHC bulletin. Grenada, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, St. Lucia, and the French island of Martinique were on tropical storm alert, as were southern Haiti and the Dominican Republic.
– Exceptional season –
In Martinique, the wind has strengthened since Sunday afternoon, with heavy showers, but not exceptional, according to AFP correspondents on the ground.
Some 10,000 customers have been left without electricity in Martinique in various municipalities, according to EDF, adding that their teams are working to find solutions to restore power.
A state of emergency has been declared on the island of Tobago, the second largest island and tourist attraction in the Trinidad and Tobago archipelago.
All schools remained closed on Monday and “will remain so until further notice,” the island’s chief executive, Farley Augustine, announced at a press briefing on Sunday.
A meeting of the Caribbean Community (Caricom), scheduled for this week on the island, has been postponed.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) had predicted an extraordinary season in late May, predicting the possibility of four to seven Category 3 or higher hurricanes.
