By: Staff Writer
July 2, 2024
The tiny island or Carriacou, Grenada was “flattened,” says Prime Minister Dickon Mitchell by the earliest storm on record hurricane for the season Beryl.
Beryl hit Carriacou as a CAT 4 storm, but has now strengthened to a CAR 5 as it barrels its way to Jamaica, having only slightly touched Barbados on its way.
Mitchell has said that the island of Carriacou has been “flattened” in just half an hour and that government officials also expected “extreme” damage on the neighbouring island of Petite Martinique.
The National Hurricane Centre in the US, said Beryl reached peak wind speeds of 160 mph as of their 11 p.m. ET Monday update, classifying the storm on the highest rung of the Saffir-Simpson hurricane scale, and beating Hurricane Emily’s climb to Category 5 status on July 16, 2005.
The storm continued to intensify Tuesday morning to 165 mph peak gusts. Those winds are 15 mph faster than when the hurricane made landfall on Carriacou Island earlier on Monday.
Trees were toppled, power was knocked out and life-threatening storm surge sent water rushing inland across the southern Windward Islands after extremely dangerous Hurricane Beryl made landfall as a high-end Category 4 storm. The storm produced catastrophic winds, which battered the region as terrified residents hunkered down in their homes and shelters, waiting for the storm’s fury to pass.
Beryl caused at least one death on Carriacou as reports state that a man died when a tree collapsed on his house on Monday.
The storm then experienced restrengthening as it emerged into the Caribbean Sea. It will remain a powerful hurricane as it moves on a westward path this week as it makes its way to Jamaica.
By Wednesday, Beryl is “expected to bring life-threatening winds and storm surge to Jamaica,” according to the National Hurricane Center. The storm is forecast to pass near the Cayman Islands on Thursday.
A hurricane warning is now in effect for Jamaica on Wednesday, where heavy rains and flash flooding are possible. A tropical storm warning is also in effect for parts of the island of Hispaniola (Haiti and the Dominican Republic)
Storm warnings are issued for an area when weather conditions are expected to arrive within 36 hours.
Those in the Cayman Islands, Belize, the Yucatan Peninsula, the remainder of the northwest Caribbean, and the southwest Gulf of Mexico are advised by the hurricane centre to monitor the storm’s progress, as Beryl’s path later in the week is uncertain.