Twenty people were confirmed dead on the island of Dominica, Prime Minister Roosevelt Skerrit said in an address carried on television and online late yesterday following Thursday’s pounding by Tropical Storm Erika, Reuters reported. Rescuers were still searching for others reported missing.
Erika was no longer forecast to make landfall in the United States as a hurricane due to some likely weakening over mountainous areas of Haiti and Cuba. Instead, it could lose tropical storm strength by today with winds falling below 40 miles per hour (64 kph) as it moves over eastern Cuba, although “very heavy rainfall” was a concern.
Erika’s sustained winds dropped to 45 mph (72 kph) as it moved over Haiti’s capital, Port-au-Prince, on Friday night, the NHC said.
Haiti’s government warned those who live by ravines, rivers and the coast to use extreme caution if they go outdoors. Mayors and local authorities were told to open schools and public buildings as makeshift shelters.
Dominica in the eastern Caribbean was the worst-affected island so far. The prime minister said swollen rivers and rain-triggered landslides had swept away homes, roads and bridges.
Some communities were cut off on the small, mountainous island with a population of about 72,000.
Skerrit said 20 people had died and several others were still missing. He described the destruction as “monumental.”
(Additonal reporting by Bill Cotterell
