Hurricane Dorian posed an increasing threat to Florida as it swirled toward a possible direct hit on the US state after leaving limited damage in Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands.
Along much of Florida’s east coast, shoppers rushed to stock up on food and emergency supplies at supermarkets and hardware stores and picked the shelves clean of bottled water.
Lines formed at service stations as motorists topped off their tanks and filled petrol cans.
Forecasters said Dorian is expected to bulk up into a dangerous Category three storm, meaning winds of at least 111mph, or perhaps even a catastrophic Category four, at 130mph or more, before hitting the US on Monday somewhere between the Florida Keys and southern Georgia.
President Donald Trump said Florida is “going to be totally ready”.
Hurricane Dorian looks like it will be hitting Florida late Sunday night. Be prepared and please follow State and Federal instructions, it will be a very big Hurricane, perhaps one of the biggest!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 29, 2019
He tweeted: “Be prepared and please follow State and Federal instructions, it will be a very big Hurricane, perhaps one of the biggest!”
Josefine Larrauri, a retired translator, went to a Publix supermarket in Miami only to find empty shelves in the water section and store employees unsure of when new cases would arrive.
“I feel helpless because the whole coast is threatened,” she said. “What’s the use of going all the way to Georgia if it can land there?”
As of late Thursday morning, Dorian was centred about 220 miles northwest of San Juan, Puerto Rico, its winds blowing at 85mph as it moved northwest at 13mph.
Also imperilled were the Bahamas, with Dorian’s projected track running just to the north of Great Abaco and Grand Bahama islands.
The storm is expected to pick up steam as it pushes out into warm waters with favourable winds, said University of Miami hurricane researcher Brian McNoldy, adding: “Starting tomorrow, it really has no obstacles left in its way,” he said.
“If it makes landfall as a Category three or four hurricane, that’s a big deal,” he said.
This morning I will be visiting the National Hurricane Center @NHC_Atlantic to receive a briefing on Hurricane #Dorian as our state continues to prepare. All Floridians should have a plan in place. Don’t wait until it is too late.
— Ron DeSantis (@GovRonDeSantis) August 29, 2019
Florida governor Ron DeSantis declared a state of emergency, and local governments distributed sandbags.
Some residents used community Facebook groups to updates on food stores getting new shipments of water.
At the Kennedy Space Centre at Cape Canaveral, Nasa decided to move indoors the mobile launch platform for its new mega rocket under development.
11 AM EDT: Here are the latest Key Messages on #Dorian https://t.co/tW4KeFW0gB pic.twitter.com/Go5d4kvSnk
— National Hurricane Center (@NHC_Atlantic) August 29, 2019
Dorian blew through the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico as a Category one hurricane on Wednesday.
Puerto Rico seemed to be spared any heavy wind and rain, a huge relief on an island where blue tarps still cover some 30,000 homes nearly two years after Hurricane Maria.
The island’s 3.2 million inhabitants also depend on an unstable power grid that remains prone to outages since it was destroyed by Maria.
Several hundred customers were without power across Puerto Rico, said Angel Figueroa, president of a utility workers union.
Police said an 80-year-old man in the town of Bayamon died after he fell trying to climb to his roof to clear it of debris ahead of the storm.
Dorian caused an island-wide blackout in St Thomas and St John in the US Virgin Islands and scattered outages in St Croix, government spokesman Richard Motta said.
No serious damage was reported in the British Virgin Islands, where governor Augustus Jaspert said crews were already clearing roads and inspecting infrastructure by late Wednesday afternoon.
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