Hurricane warnings were in effect for Barbados, Grenada, St. Lucia, Tobago and St. Vincent and the Grenadines as thousands of people hunkered down in homes and shelters hoping for the best.
“It’s going to be terrible,” Ralph Gonsalves, prime minister of St. Vincent and the Grenadines, said ahead of the storm as he urged people to stay indoors “and wait this monster out.”
The last strong hurricane to hit the southeast Caribbean was Hurricane Ivan nearly 20 years ago, which killed dozens of people in Grenada.
Beryl was located 125 miles east-southeast of Grenada early Monday. It had maximum sustained winds of 120 miles per hour and was moving west at 20 mph. It was a compact storm, with hurricane-force winds extending 35 miles from its center.
A tropical storm warning was in effect for Martinique and Trinidad. A tropical storm watch was issued for Dominica, Haiti’s entire southern coast, and from Punta Palenque in the Dominican Republic west to the border with Haiti.
Forecasters warned of a life-threatening storm surge of up to 9 feet (3 meters) in areas where Beryl will make landfall, with 3 to 6 inches of rain for Barbados and nearby islands and possibly 10 inches in some areas, especially in Grenada and the Grenadines.
“This is a very dangerous situation,” warned the National Hurricane Center in Miami.
The storm was expected to weaken slightly over the Caribbean Sea on a path that would take it just south of Jamaica and later toward Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula as a Category 1.
“It should be emphasized that Beryl is forecast to remain a significant hurricane during its entire trek across the Caribbean region,” the National Hurricane Center said.
