SAN JUAN (AP) – Hurricane Beryl bore down on the southeast Caribbean yesterday as a powerful Category 3 storm after previously becoming the earliest storm of Category 4 strength to form in the Atlantic, fuelled by record warm waters.
Hurricane warnings were in effect for Barbados, Grenada, St. Lucia, Tobago and St. Vincent and the Grenadines as thousands of people hunkered down in homes and shelters hoping for the best.
“It’s going to be terrible,” Prime Minister of St. Vincent and the Grenadines Ralph Gonsalves, said ahead of the storm as he urged people to stay indoors “and wait this monster out”.
The last strong hurricane to hit the southeast Caribbean was Hurricane Ivan nearly 20 years ago, which killed dozens of people in Grenada.
Beryl was located 125 miles east-southeast of Grenada early yesterday. It had maximum sustained winds of 120 miles per hour and was moving west at 20 mph. It was a compact storm, with hurricane-force winds extending 35 miles (55 kilometers) from its center.
A tropical storm warning was in effect for Martinique and Trinidad. A tropical storm watch was issued for Dominica, Haiti’s entire southern coast, and from Punta Palenque in the Dominican Republic west to the border with Haiti.
