Hurricane Fiona hit the Dominican Republic on Monday after toppling power across Puerto Rico, causing damage that the governor described as “catastrophic.”
No deaths were reported, but authorities on US soil said it was too early to know the full extent of the damage from an expanding storm that was expected to bring heavy rains across Puerto Rico on Monday.
It was expected to reach 30 inches for the southern region of Puerto Rico. Up to 15 inches were dropped in the eastern Dominican Republic.
“It’s important that people realize that this is not over,” said Ernesto Morales, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in San Juan.
He said the flooding had reached “historic levels” as authorities evacuated or rescued hundreds of people across the island.
NOAA
At 8:00 AM EST The National Hurricane Center said That “hurricane conditions” were continuing over parts of the Dominican Republic. “Heavy rain and catastrophic flooding” continued in most parts of Puerto Rico.
“The damage we’re seeing is catastrophic,” Governor Pedro Pierluisi said.
FEMA Director Dean Cresswell said in a statement to CBS News Sunday night that the agency “actively supports” Puerto Rico and “immediately deployed hundreds of FEMA personnel before the storm made landfall.”
“Our focus is now on efforts to save lives and respond to immediate needs such as energy recovery,” Cresswell said.
Before dawn on Monday, authorities sailed on a boat through the flooded streets of the northern coastal town of Katano and used a megaphone to alert people of broken pumps, urging them to evacuate as quickly as possible.
Brown water flowed into the streets, into homes and consumed the airport runway in southern Puerto Rico.
Fiona also tore asphalt off roads and swept a bridge in the central mountain town of Ottoado that police said was erected by the National Guard after Hurricane Maria struck in 2017 as a Category 4 storm.
The storm also tore down rooftops, including Nelson Sereno’s home in the northern coastal town of Luisa.
“I was sleeping and I saw when the corrugated metal went out,” he said, watching the rain drench his belongings and the wind draping his colorful curtains in the air.
Fiona’s center was 35 miles southeast of Samana in the Dominican Republic, with maximum winds of 90 miles per hour Monday morning, according to the US National Hurricane Center. It was moving to the northwest at eight miles per hour.
Tropical storm winds extended 150 miles from the center.
Forecasters said the storm was expected to appear over the Atlantic in the afternoon and pass near the Turks and Caicos Islands on Tuesday. It could be near Bermuda as a major hurricane as late as Thursday or Friday.
Fiona struck Puerto Rico on the anniversary of Hurricane Hugo, which hit the island in 1989 as a Category 3 storm, and two days before the anniversary of the devastating Hurricane Maria in 2017 — from which the territory has yet to fully recover.
This cyclone killed nearly 3,000 people and destroyed the power grid. Five years later, more than 3,000 homes still have a blue tarp roof.
On Monday, authorities announced the restoration of electricity to 100,000 customers on an island of 3.2 million people, but electricity distribution company Loma said it could take days to fully restore service.
Jose Rodriguez/AFP via Getty Images
US President Joe Biden declared a state of emergency on US soil as the eye of the storm approaches the southwest corner of the island.
Health centers in Puerto Rico were powered by generators – and some failed. Health Minister Carlos Melado said crews rushed to repair generators at the Comprehensive Cancer Center, where many patients had been evacuated.
Officials said Fiona previously hit the Eastern Caribbean, killing a man in the French province of Guadeloupe when floods swept away his home.
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