Hurricane Fiona makes landfall in the Dominican Republic as most of Puerto Rico remains without power

The Category 1 hurricane made landfall near Boca de Yuma at 3:30 a.m. with maximum sustained winds of 90 miles per hour, according to the National Hurricane Center.

As the storm slowly moves northwest, torrential rain is still falling in Puerto Rico, where more than 1.4 million people are without power.

At least one person has so far been reported dead in Basse-Terre, the capital of the French territory of Guadeloupe, the vice president of the territory’s environment agency said. he said on Sunday.

Hurricane Fiona 'catastrophic' floods Puerto Rico as area remains without power

The hurricane made landfall on the southwestern coast of Puerto Rico on Sunday afternoon, bringing strong winds to bear on the island. 75 miles per hour and 6 to 24 inches of rain is expected in some areas by the end of the day National Weather Service.

Fiona will continue to hit Puerto Rico and eastern parts of the Dominican Republic until Monday. According to the hurricane center, the eastern parts of the Dominican Republic could also see flash floods and mudslides in high areas in addition to flooding. Fiona could bring as much as 30 inches of rain to Puerto Rico and up to 12 inches to the eastern and northern Dominican Republic.

Fiona is expected to track across the Atlantic.

The hurricane is forecast to strengthen after passing over the Dominican Republic and move toward the Turks, Caicos and Bahamas on Monday and Tuesday. National Hurricane Center. Turks and Caicos is under a hurricane warning, while the southern Bahamas is under a tropical storm watch.

LUMA Energy, Puerto Rico’s main electric utility, said in a statement Sunday that it could be days before power is restored, adding that “several transmission line outages” were contributing to the outage. Governor Pedro Pierluisi wrote on Facebook that the process will be implemented “gradually”.

Website PowerOutage.us The entire island was without power early Monday morning, he said, adding that LUMA had “re-energized some circuits, but there is limited information and no numbers on how many customers have been restored.”

Power outages have become a familiar crisis for many in Puerto Rico. Residents lived just five months ago another lighting on the island after a fire broke out at the power station.

Parts of the island still bear the scars of Hurricane Maria, which devastated Puerto Rico almost exactly five years ago. After Hurricane Maria caused catastrophic damage due to the infrastructure of the area, it took almost a year to restore power to the island.

Samuel Rivera and his mother, Lourdes Rodriguez, lived without electricity for nearly a year after Maria Rivera was shot, CNN’s Layla Santiago told CNN. On Sunday morning, they lost power again, creating similar scares as they did five years ago.

They also expressed concern that the nearby river would flood and trees surrounding their homes could be felled by strong winds.

Life-threatening flood tears in Puerto Rico

As Hurricane Fiona made landfall on Sunday, much of Puerto Rico was under a flash flood warning ahead of heavy downpours. The National Weather Service in San Juan warned of “catastrophic” and life-threatening flood conditions.

A video of the dangerous floods shows the waters flowing easily remove the bridge, carries its structure downstream. Another painting by Samuel De Jesús depicts a scene of sheets of rain in the city of Arecibo, with fast-moving waters overturning large construction machines and entire trees.

Many rivers on the east side of the island were in moderate to major flood stages as of Sunday afternoon, including one southeast river that rose above 12 feet in less than 7 hours. The National Weather Service also issued a flash flood warning for south central Puerto Rico on Sunday night.

Evacuees take shelter in a public school classroom in Guayanilla, Puerto Rico.

In response to the risk facing Puerto Rico, President Joe Biden approved a state of emergency declaration Sunday morning to provide federal aid to disaster relief efforts.

Anne Bink, the agency’s assistant administrator for Response and Recovery, told CNN that more than 300 FEMA emergency workers were on the ground responding to the crisis.

“Our hearts go out to residents who, five years later, are experiencing yet another catastrophic event,” Bink said, marking the fifth anniversary of Hurricane Maria. According to him, this time FEMA plans to implement the lessons learned from the 2017 crisis.

“We were more prepared. We now have four warehouses strategically located all over the island that contain goods, exponentially larger supplies than in the past,” he said.

“We’re proactively out there to make sure we’re coordinating — and well ahead of any storm. And all the planning efforts we put in on those blue-sky days can pay off when the rain comes.”

CNN’s Leila Santiago, Jamiel Lynch, Alfonso Serrano, Caitlin Kaiser, Allie Malloy, Haley Brink, Dakin Andone and Robert Shackelford contributed to this report.