The Prague Post - Hurricane Beryl churns towards Mexico after hammering Jamaica

EUR -
AED 4.156204
AFN 80.905181
ALL 98.514057
AMD 441.525182
ANG 2.039378
AOA 1036.498435
ARS 1327.070138
AUD 1.766087
AWG 2.039615
AZN 1.924015
BAM 1.953699
BBD 2.291656
BDT 137.9017
BGN 1.955882
BHD 0.42652
BIF 3322.225303
BMD 1.131548
BND 1.482892
BOB 7.842566
BRL 6.464877
BSD 1.134989
BTN 95.917849
BWP 15.537154
BYN 3.714338
BYR 22178.3433
BZD 2.279868
CAD 1.563901
CDF 3250.938267
CHF 0.936808
CLF 0.027947
CLP 1072.436239
CNY 8.227882
CNH 8.206191
COP 4751.18954
CRC 573.278427
CUC 1.131548
CUP 29.986025
CVE 110.146548
CZK 24.91107
DJF 201.09818
DKK 7.46273
DOP 66.797575
DZD 150.016043
EGP 57.469159
ERN 16.973222
ETB 152.314128
FJD 2.558997
FKP 0.84828
GBP 0.849844
GEL 3.106076
GGP 0.84828
GHS 16.173607
GIP 0.84828
GMD 80.908658
GNF 9830.341527
GTQ 8.7406
GYD 238.173867
HKD 8.77558
HNL 29.453196
HRK 7.539475
HTG 148.272685
HUF 404.12338
IDR 18611.364138
ILS 4.099797
IMP 0.84828
INR 94.948655
IQD 1486.558306
IRR 47652.341704
ISK 145.687036
JEP 0.84828
JMD 179.675982
JOD 0.802494
JPY 164.28099
KES 146.366209
KGS 98.95409
KHR 4542.873687
KMF 491.658382
KPW 1018.406193
KRW 1604.758684
KWD 0.347181
KYD 0.945728
KZT 582.34853
LAK 24538.827685
LBP 101695.035383
LKR 339.757626
LRD 226.995888
LSL 21.133959
LTL 3.341167
LVL 0.684462
LYD 6.195392
MAD 10.524418
MDL 19.482221
MGA 5039.58041
MKD 61.527889
MMK 2375.728507
MNT 4044.597049
MOP 9.066867
MRU 45.001715
MUR 51.507862
MVR 17.437378
MWK 1968.083513
MXN 22.146966
MYR 4.857168
MZN 72.418452
NAD 21.130322
NGN 1817.549596
NIO 41.764717
NOK 11.755348
NPR 153.468959
NZD 1.909442
OMR 0.43563
PAB 1.134979
PEN 4.161425
PGK 4.633976
PHP 62.91351
PKR 318.900852
PLN 4.278024
PYG 9090.304577
QAR 4.136751
RON 4.978242
RSD 117.054981
RUB 92.641063
RWF 1630.439413
SAR 4.243512
SBD 9.461211
SCR 16.579778
SDG 679.488611
SEK 10.982581
SGD 1.4774
SHP 0.889219
SLE 25.788283
SLL 23727.980087
SOS 648.599627
SRD 41.694135
STD 23420.761654
SVC 9.929698
SYP 14712.819331
SZL 21.115293
THB 37.512512
TJS 11.962635
TMT 3.960418
TND 3.370875
TOP 2.650195
TRY 43.637362
TTD 7.686477
TWD 35.378759
TZS 3052.443888
UAH 47.08363
UGX 4157.528973
USD 1.131548
UYU 47.75864
UZS 14676.816925
VES 98.148188
VND 29425.909057
VUV 136.447254
WST 3.138076
XAF 655.249446
XAG 0.034732
XAU 0.000348
XCD 3.058066
XDR 0.818123
XOF 655.258123
XPF 119.331742
YER 277.173099
ZAR 20.884196
ZMK 10185.282584
ZMW 31.581316
ZWL 364.358035
  • RBGPF

    67.2100

    67.21

    +100%

  • CMSC

    0.0200

    22.03

    +0.09%

  • GSK

    -1.1000

    38.75

    -2.84%

  • RIO

    -0.8500

    58.55

    -1.45%

  • SCS

    -0.0500

    9.87

    -0.51%

  • BTI

    -0.2500

    43.3

    -0.58%

  • CMSD

    -0.0400

    22.26

    -0.18%

  • BCC

    -0.5700

    92.71

    -0.61%

  • AZN

    -1.2800

    70.51

    -1.82%

  • NGG

    -1.3500

    71.65

    -1.88%

  • RELX

    -0.5500

    54.08

    -1.02%

  • JRI

    0.1000

    13.01

    +0.77%

  • RYCEF

    -0.1000

    10.12

    -0.99%

  • BP

    0.4200

    27.88

    +1.51%

  • BCE

    -0.8100

    21.44

    -3.78%

  • VOD

    -0.0300

    9.73

    -0.31%

Hurricane Beryl churns towards Mexico after hammering Jamaica
Hurricane Beryl churns towards Mexico after hammering Jamaica / Photo: Elizabeth Ruiz - AFP

Hurricane Beryl churns towards Mexico after hammering Jamaica

Deadly Hurricane Beryl powered towards Mexico late Wednesday, after battering Jamaica's southern coast with devastating winds and sea surge.

Text size:

The Category 4 storm has left a trail of destruction in its path across the Caribbean, killing at least seven people as it has strengthened rapidly.

Beryl was pulling away from Jamaica late Wednesday and was expected to pass just south of the Cayman Islands overnight, before moving onward to Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula, the US National Hurricane Center (NHC) said.

The storm is the first since NHC records began to reach the Category 4 level in June and the earliest to reach Category 5 in July.

Mexican officials are scrambling to prepare, with Beryl expected to bring damaging winds, a dangerous storm surge and heavy rainfall over the Yucatan Peninsula and Belize.

"We will have intense rains and wind gusts" from Thursday, Civil Protection national coordinator Laura Velazquez said, announcing the deployment of hundreds of military personnel, marines and electricity workers in anticipation of damage.

The government has prepared 112 shelters with a capacity for around 20,000 people and suspended school in the state of Quintana Roo, where Beryl will likely hit.

In Jamaica, "life-threatening flash flooding and mudslides from heavy rainfall" were still expected overnight, the NHC said.

More than 400,000 people were without power, according to the Jamaica Gleaner newspaper, citing a public service company.

The devastating hurricane-force winds, life-threatening storm surge, and damaging waves that continue to damage Jamaica are expected in the Cayman Islands overnight, when Beryl passes by while at or near major hurricane intensity.

Jamaica Prime Minister Andrew Holness had declared a curfew from 6:00 am to 6:00 pm across the island of 2.8 million and urged Jamaicans to comply with evacuation orders.

Desmon Brown, manager of the National Stadium in Kingston, said his staff had scrambled to be ready.

"We've taped up our windows, covered our equipment -- including computers, printers and that sort of thing. Apart from that, it's mainly concrete so there's not much we can do," Brown told the Jamaica Observer newspaper.

As of Wednesday night, Beryl was packing maximum sustained winds of 130 mph (215 kph), said the NHC.

- 'No communication' -

Beryl has already left a trail of death with at least three people killed in Grenada, where the storm made landfall Monday, as well as one in St Vincent and the Grenadines and three in Venezuela.

Ralph Gonsalves, prime minister of St Vincent and the Grenadines, said that it would take a "herculean effort" to rebuild after the substantial destruction and that "90-odd percent of the houses were blown away" on Union Island.

"Most of the country doesn't have electricity, and more than half without water at the moment," he said.

Grenada's Prime Minister Dickon Mitchell said the island of Carriacou, which was struck by the eye of the storm, has been all but cut off, with houses, telecommunications and fuel facilities there flattened.

The 13.5-square mile (35-square kilometer) island is home to around 9,000 people. At least two people there died, Mitchell said, with a third killed on the country's main island of Grenada when a tree fell on a house.

In St Vincent and the Grenadines, one person on the island of Bequia was reported dead from the storm, while a man died in Venezuela's northeastern coastal state of Sucre when he was swept away by a flooded river, officials there said.

- Climate change -

It is extremely rare for such a powerful storm to form this early in the Atlantic hurricane season, which runs from early June to late November.

Warm ocean temperatures are key for hurricanes, and North Atlantic waters are currently between two and five degrees Fahrenheit (1-3 degrees Celsius) warmer than normal, according to the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

 

"Disasters on a scale that used to be the stuff of science fiction are becoming meteorological facts, and the climate crisis is the chief culprit," he said Monday, reporting that his parents' property was damaged.

B.Hornik--TPP