A REALLY NASTY STORM The Caribbean braces for Matthew

Posted on 10/04/2016 | About Cuba

All of Haiti and Jamaica were under hurricane warnings Monday night, along with the southeast and central Bahamas and the Cuban provinces of Guantanamo, Santiago de Cuba, Holguin, Granma and Las Tunas. As it bears down on Haiti, Hurricane Matthew is "just an absolute powerhouse," said Ari Sarsalari, a meteorologist for The Weather Channel. In Jamaica and eastern Cuba, he said, it will be "a really nasty storm.”

In Haiti, where thousands of people still live in tents following the massive earthquake of 2010, authorities have urged people to stock up on food and water and secure their homes.
Haitian officials say that about 1,300 emergency shelters have been built, enough to accommodate 340,000 people. Both airports in Haiti are closed.
About 13,000 people were evacuated from high-risk areas in neighbouring Dominican Republic, which is also expected to get battered by rains and winds, according to the country's civil defence chief.
Heavy rain and winds have already hit parts of Jamaica, with floodwaters blocking roads in the capital Kingston.
Matthew is later expected to reach eastern Cuba, where a hurricane alert is in place for six eastern provinces and residents are being moved from low-lying areas.
By Wednesday, Hurricane Matthew could be in the Bahamas and possibly in the Turks and Caicos Islands.
matthew_map
After that, the storm could be heading for Florida, where "direct hurricane impacts are possible" later this week, said Michael Brennan, a forecaster for the National Hurricane Center.
The governors of Florida and North Carolina, meanwhile, were taking no chances. Florida Gov. Rick Scott activated a state of emergency in all counties Monday afternoon and North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory declared a state of emergency in 66 counties, saying, "We want to be prepared.
"While we do not yet know how Hurricane Matthew will impact North Carolina, we do know that we can expect some form of impacts on our state," McCrory said at a news conference.
"Already, we've seen substantial flooding in eastern and central parts of the state from recent rain events, and many areas are already saturated," he said. "We are taking this storm seriously, and I encourage residents and visitors do the same."
Check with tour operators and airlines for individual schedules and policies.
Hurricane Categories:
With all the conversation about hurricane categories, we thought it might be interesting to outline what they actually are – and what can be expected:
• Category one: sustained winds of 74-95mph (119-153 km/h); some damage and power cuts
• Category two: winds of 96-110mph (154-177 km/h); extensive damage
• Category three: winds of 111-129mph (178-208 km/h); well-built homes suffer major damage
• Category four: winds of 130-156mph (209-251 km/h); severe damage to well-built homes, most trees snapped or uprooted
• Category five: winds of 157 mph (252 km/h) or higher; high percentage of homes destroyed, area uninhabitable for weeks or months