Ivan picking up speed

2004-09-12 10:31

Bull Bay, Jamaica - Hurricane Ivan strengthened to a rare Category 5 storm capable of catastrophic damage, leaving Jamaica and aiming for the Cayman Islands with winds reaching 265km/h, the US National Hurricane Centre said.

Ivan has killed 56 people across the Caribbean so far this week, including 34 in Grenada and 11 in Jamaica.

Millions more people are in its path, with Ivan projected to go between the Cayman Islands, make a direct hit on Cuba and then either move into the Gulf of Mexico or hit South Florida.

"If God doesn't help us, I think this is going to be extremely tragic," said Maria del Carmen Boza, a 65-year-old resident of Cojimar, a seaside community in Cuba once frequented by writer Ernest Hemingway. "All of Cuba is worried. This looks like it's going to be really dangerous."

President Fidel Castro sought to assuage such concerns.

"This country is prepared to face this hurricane," Castro said Saturday night on state television, saying his government had mobilised to save lives and property.

A Category 5 storm is the most powerful, packing winds of at least 249km/h and causing a storm surge of at least 5.4m.

30cm of rain

At 20:00 on Saturday, the hurricane's winds were 265km/h and its well-defined eye was about 233km east-southeast of Grand Cayman, a popular offshore banking centre where secrecy laws protect transactions. Hurricane-force winds extended 100km and tropical storm-force winds another 282km. The storm was moving west-northwest at about 14.5km/h and was expected to reach the Cayman Islands on Sunday.

The storm could dump up to 30cm of rain, possibly causing flash floods and mud slides, the Hurricane Centre said.

If Ivan hits land in the Caribbean at its current strength, it would be the first Category 5 storm to do so since Hurricane David devastated the Dominican Republic in 1979, said Rafael Mojica, a meteorologist at the Hurricane Centre in Miami. Hurricane Mitch was a Category 5 storm in the Caribbean Sea in 1998, but it hit Central America.

Only three Category 5 storms are known to have hit the United States. The last was Hurricane Andrew, which hit South Florida in 1992, killing 43 people and causing more than $30 billion in damage.

Jamaica, an island of 2.6 million known for its beaches, reggae music and Blue Mountain coffee, was saved from a direct hit when the hurricane unexpectedly wobbled and lurched to the west. Jamaica was ravaged by winds just below 249kmh.

"Mercifully, we were spared a direct hit and whatever our religion, faith or persuasions may be, we must give thanks," Jamaican Prime Minister PJ Patterson said in an address to the nation.

Looters

East of Kingston, the capital, dazed survivors stood in the rain and watched 7.5m waves crash onto beachfronts where a dozen houses used to stand at Harbour View. Associated Press reporters saw looters carrying boxes of groceries from a smashed storefront.

Five people drowned or were struck by trees that crashed into their homes, said Ronald Jackson of Jamaica's disaster relief agency. Patterson said 11 people had been killed, but he did not elaborate.

Ivan also has been blamed for the deaths of five people in Venezuela, one in Tobago, one in Barbados, and four children in the Dominican Republic.

Forecasters warned that Ivan could strike Florida, where buildings in the Keys were mostly boarded up, deserted by evacuating residents and tourists. Ivan is approaching hard on the heels of hurricanes Charley and Frances.

In the wealthy Cayman Islands and in Cuba, people braced for the worst.

Fleeing the Caymans

Hundreds of Caymanians fled aboard 10 charter flights scheduled for an evacuation. On Saturday, most of the 150 residents of Little Cayman evacuated to Grand Cayman, and about 755 people on Cayman Brac - more than half the population - and more than 600 people on the main Grand Cayman island moved into shelters, officials reported.

The British territory has about 45 000 residents.

Cuba has upgraded a hurricane watch to a warning for the threatened western part of the island.

National radio exhorted Cubans to "put into practice the solidarity that characterises our nation" by inviting neighbours in vulnerable homes to seek shelter in more stable buildings. More than 480 000 people across the island of 11.2 million were evacuated by Saturday evening, Lt Col Domingo Carretero, head of Cuba's Civil Defence programme, told the government's National Information Agency news service.

Jamaicans largely ignored government pleas for 500 000 people to flee flood-prone areas. Only 5 000 were in shelters when Ivan stalked the southern coast, coming to within 56km of Kingston.

- AP