Dramatic before-and-after photos taken in Puerto Rico show the devastation left behind after deadly Hurricane Fiona lashed the island with high winds and torrential rain this week.
Not less than eight people have reportedly been killed across the Caribbean after Hurricane Fiona tore through the region, making two landfalls in Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic after which moving near the Turks and Caicos Islands on a path toward Bermuda.
As well as, Hurricane Fiona overwhelmed Puerto Rico’s power grid and plunged the island’s greater than 1.4 million power customers into darkness.
As of Thursday, most of Puerto Rico remained without power.
FOX Weather correspondent Nicole Valdes, who has been in Puerto Rico since Tuesday, said about 80% of the island – greater than 1 million customers – continues to be without power as of Thursday as heat bakes the region.
The dearth of electricity is making it difficult for residents to search out working gas pumps to buy fuel for his or her generators, in accordance with Valdes.
On top of the facility outages, Valdes reported about 600,000 customers were without running water as of Wednesday.
“Resources are slowly going to start out to wear thin,” Valdes said. “Those that have saved up water or perhaps have water tanks, that’s only set to last them for concerning the next few days.”
Puerto Rico wasn’t the one Caribbean island to feel the results of Hurricane Fiona.
The Dominican Republic received a direct hit from the deadly storm hours after it made its first landfall along the southwestern coast of Puerto Rico.
Hurricane Fiona was barely stronger when it slammed into the Dominican Republic but was still a Category 1 hurricane with winds of 90 mph.
Videos posted to social media showed high winds lashing the resort location of Punta Cana.
And several other flights, including a JetBlue flight from Punta Cana to Latest York City, flew directly over Hurricane Fiona’s eye.
Nevertheless, JetBlue stressed that meteorologists and other airline officials at all times have passenger safety as a top priority and wouldn’t have flown over the storm if it wasn’t secure.
In truth, JetBlue said several other flights needed to be canceled because conditions weren’t secure for aircraft.
After pummeling Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic, Hurricane Fiona set its sights on the Turks and Caicos Islands.
Video from the island Providenciales showed the outer bands of Fiona’s hurricane-force winds lashing the island’s shores.
By late Tuesday morning, the Turks and Caicos deputy governor reported island-wide power outages on Grand Turk, Salt Cay, South Caicos and North/Middle Caicos.
Hurricane Fiona is now on a path that is anticipated to bring the monster storm very near Bermuda.
A Hurricane Warning has been issued for Bermuda upfront of the storm’s arrival.
One other dramatic image was posted to Twitter showing how severe the island-wide blackout was on Puerto Rico.
The image shows the brilliant lights from cities across the islands before Hurricane Fiona’s arrival, after which a lot of the island at nighttime after the deadly hurricane swept by.
