Bahamians stunned in Dorian’s wake

Stunned residents of the Bahamas surveyed the wreckage of their homes and officials struggled to assess the number killed by Hurricane Dorian, as the storm bore down on the South Carolina coast yesterday, threatening record flooding. Some 70,000 people in the Bahamas needed immediate humanitarian relief after the most damaging storm ever to hit the island nation, the United Nations said.

Aerial video of the worst-hit Abaco Islands in the northern Bahamas showed widespread devastation, with the harbor, shops, workplaces, a hospital and airport landing strips damaged or decimated, frustrating rescue efforts. One of the most powerful Caribbean storms on record, Dorian was rated a Category 5 hurricane when it killed at least 20 people in the Bahamas. Authorities expect that number to rise, Prime Minister Hubert Minnis said at a news briefing, as retreating floodwaters revealed the scope of destruction.

One of the storm survivors on the Abaco Islands, Ramond King, said he watched as swirling winds ripped the roof off his house, then churned to a neighbor’s home to pluck the entire structure into the sky. “‘This can’t be real, this can’t be real’,” King recalled thinking. “Nothing is here, nothing at all. Everything is gone, just bodies.” With telephones down in many areas, residents posted lists of missing loved ones on social media.

One Facebook post by media outlet Our News Bahamas had 2,500 comments, mainly listing lost family members. Dorian killed one person in Puerto Rico before hovering over the Bahamas for two days with torrential rains and fierce winds that whipped up 12- to 18-foot (3.7- to 5.5-meter) storm surges.

Dorian was barreling north-northeast just off the coast of the United States on Thursday, moving at about 8 miles per hour (13 kph) with 110 mph (175 kph) winds, the top strength of a Category 2 storm on the five-point Saffir-Simpson wind scale. More than 2.2 million people in Florida, Georgia, North Carolina and South Carolina had been ordered to evacuate, but Florida avoided a direct hit.