Hurricane Dorian moves toward Florida after inflicting 'extreme damage' on the Bahamas

Hurricane Dorian has left parts of tourism-dependent Bahamas in ruins and relief officials on Tuesday were preparing for an unfolding humanitarian crisis with the scale of the catastrophe only beginning to emerge.

Aerial video recorded over the Bahamas’ Great Abaco Island showed mile upon mile of flooded neighborhoods, pulverized buildings, upturned boats and shipping containers scattered like Lego toys. Many buildings that had not been flattened had walls or roofs partly ripped away.

While its winds had diminished to a Category 2 storm on the five-step Saffir-Simpson scale of intensity, Dorian expanded in size and picked up speed on Tuesday. Forecasters said it would come “dangerously close” in the next 36 hours to Florida’s east coast, where more than a million people have been ordered evacuated.

Bahamas Prime Minister Hubert Minnis on Tuesday put the death toll at seven.

“We can expect more deaths to be recorded. This is just preliminary information,” Minnis told a news conference. “Marsh Harbor has suffered, I would estimate, in excess of 60 percent damage to their homes,” Minnis said, referring to the port on Great Abaco.

“The Mud, as we know, has been completely destroyed or decimated,” he said in reference to a shantytown known as The Mud and The Peas.

One Twitter post with the handle @mvp242 described how “victims are being loaded on flatbed trucks across Abaco,” showing a rain-blurred photo of limp bodies strewn across a truck bed. Other messages on Twitter described whole communities being swept away.

More pics of the devastation #Dorian2019 left! ##AbacoIslands #dorianbahamas pic.twitter.com/F88f6yKNSE

— MVP (@mvp242) September 3, 2019

Minnis said he saw people waving for help in a community near Coopers Town on Great Abaco, after it had been cut off by flooding.

“There were around 30 people trapped and waving yellow flags, sheets and shirts to bring our attention to their survival,” said Minnis.

A video posted on Twitter showed a storm surge rising up inside a two-story home, the sofa and other furniture floating toward the second floor. Another showed residents trying to swim from one home to another through the surge.

In another, a woman repeatedly says: “Please, pray for us,” after the storm ripped the roof off her apartment building and she sheltered on top with her 4-month-old baby and other residents. “Some people the water just sucked them,” she said. Some people didn’t make it.”

Reports from Grand Bahama island and its main town of Freeport have been more sketchy. Relief agencies have been unable to get through because of weather conditions, Minnis said.

The Miami-based US National Hurricane Center said storm surges in Grand Bahama were 3.7-5.5 m above normal tide levels.