By: Staff Writer
July 5, 2024
Hurricane Beryl left Grenada as a Category 5 Hurricane and now leaving the Caymans and Jamaica as a Category 2 Hurricane on to the Yucatan peninsula.
Parts of Grenada has been left flattened, says that nation’s Prime Minister on Tuesday. There were reports of at least 2 deaths in Grenada. It also reportedly damaged or destroyed 95 percent of homes in St Vincent and the Grenadines (SVG).
The SVG prime minister, Ralph Gonsalves, expressed his concern about accessing grants to rebuild, while his Grenadian counterpart, Dickon Mitchell, told reporters he was hoping to trigger his country’s catastrophic risk insurance policy.
As for Jamaica, there was a reported seven deaths as a result of Beryl as Prime Minister Andrew Holness asked the nation to brace for the worst of it this past Wednesday.
The hurricane’s eyewall skirted Jamaica’s southern coast as a powerful category 4 storm, ripping off roofs, uprooting electric poles and trees and causing widespread flooding.
The Miami-based National Hurricane Center said that the Cayman Islands were being hit by strong winds, dangerous storm surge and damaging waves Thursday as Beryl was moving away from them.
With Beryl forecast to weaken over the next day or two, the storm was still at major hurricane strength when it passed Jamaica, the center said. Wind-whipped rain pounded the island for hours as residents heeded authorities’ call to shelter until the storm had passed. Power was knocked out in much of the capital of Kingston.
Beryl made its way through the Cayman Islands on Thursday morning and is expected to be a dangerous hurricane when it hits the Yucatan Peninsula overnight and into Friday, despite its weakening.
The storm became the earliest recorded Category 5 hurricane ever surpassing the previous record by more than two weeks. The record was previously held by Hurricane Emily which arrived on July 17, 2005.
As of Thursday afternoon, Beryl’s center was some 200 miles west of Grand Cayman island with maximum sustained winds of 110 mph, the hurricane center said. It was moving west-northwest at 18 mph with hurricane-force winds extending about 30 miles from the storm’s center. Major hurricane strength is defined as a Category 3 hurricane or higher, which means it has maximum sustained winds of at least 111 mph. Beryl was downgraded to a Category 2 Thursday afternoon, with winds just shy of the Category 3 mark at 110 mph.