Hurricane Beryl strengthened into a top-level Category 5 hurricane late Monday as it lashed several islands in the southeastern Caribbean, dumping heavy rain and damaging winds.
The US National Hurricane Center (NHC) said Beryl was the earliest Category 5 hurricane ever to hit the Atlantic Ocean, and had strengthened into a “potentially destructive” hurricane with maximum winds of 160 miles (260 kilometers) per hour.
The NHC said the storm’s “extremely dangerous wall” made a direct hit on Grenada’s Carriacou island earlier in the day, with sustained winds gusting to more than 150 mph.
Nearby islands, including Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, also experienced “destructive winds and life-threatening storm surges”, according to the NHC.
“Carriacou was destroyed in half an hour,” Grenada’s Prime Minister Dickon Mitchell said at a news conference.
“We are not out of the woods yet,” Mitchell said, adding that while no deaths had been reported so far, they could not say with certainty that there were no deaths.
Video obtained by AFP from St George’s, Grenada, showed heavy rain and strong winds uprooting trees.
Michel later said on social media that the government was working to deliver relief supplies to both Carriacou and Petite Martinique islands on Tuesday.
“The state of emergency is still in effect. Stay indoors,” he wrote on Facebook.
Rare early intense storm
Beryl became the first hurricane of the 2024 Atlantic season on Saturday and has rapidly grown in strength.
Experts say it’s rare for such a powerful storm to form so early in the Atlantic hurricane season — which runs from early June to late November.
According to NHC records, this is the first hurricane to reach Category 4 status in June, and the earliest hurricane to reach Category 5 in July.
“Only five major (Category 3+) hurricanes have ever been recorded in the Atlantic before the first week of July,” hurricane expert Michael Lowry wrote on the social media platform X.
Barbados appears to have been spared the worst of the hurricane’s effects but is still experiencing strong winds and heavy rainfall, though officials have not yet reported any casualties.
Home Affairs and Information Minister Wilfred Abrahams said in an online video that Barbados appeared to have “dodged a bullet,” but that “there are still strong winds, there are still gale force winds,” he said.
Homes and businesses were flooded in some areas, and fishing boats were damaged in Bridgetown.
Classes were cancelled on several islands on Monday because of the storm, while a meeting of Caribbean regional bloc CARICOM scheduled to take place this week in Grenada was postponed.
Jamaica has issued a hurricane warning ahead of the storm’s expected landfall on Wednesday. The NHC has also warned areas along the Cayman Islands and the Yucatan Peninsula to monitor the storm’s progress.
extreme weather
Category 3 or higher on the Saffir–Simpson scale are considered major hurricanes.
The U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said in late May that this year’s hurricane season is expected to be “exceptional,” with up to seven storms of Category 3 or higher.
The agency cited warmer temperatures in the Atlantic Ocean and conditions related to the seasonal phenomenon La Nina in the Pacific Ocean for the expected increase in storms.
Extreme weather events, including hurricanes, have become more frequent and more destructive in recent years as a result of climate change.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
