Hurricane Beryl roared through open waters on Tuesday as a monstrous Category 5 storm heading toward Jamaica after earlier making landfall in the southeast Caribbean, killing at least four people.
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00:00A powerful Category 5 hurricane, maximum sustained winds, about 160 miles per hour.
00:06Again, moving off to the west-northwest at 22 miles per hour. You can see the heavy rain bands
00:11starting to affect portions of Puerto Rico, but starting to move in now into portions of the
00:15Dominican Republic. The good news is we think this morning that barrels intensity has peaked.
00:19We've seen the central pressure rise a little bit on the latest data from the Hurricane Hunter
00:24aircraft. We've seen the peak winds come down just a tad, but regardless of what happens to
00:28the peak winds, we're expecting a powerful hurricane to be moving west-northwestward
00:32across the Caribbean Sea. We're expecting the core of barrel to pass just south of the south
00:36coast of Haiti as we go through the day today and into tonight. We have a hurricane watch and a
00:42tropical storm warning in effect for the southern coast of Haiti, tropical storm warning in effect
00:46for portions of the southern Dominican Republic. So we could see hurricane conditions there. We are
00:50expecting tropical storm conditions there, expecting very heavy rainfall there as well.
00:54We are most concerned about Jamaica, where we're expecting the core of a major hurricane to pass
00:58near or over the island during the day tomorrow. So we have a hurricane warning in effect for
01:03Jamaica. We are expecting a storm surge of five to eight feet above normal tide levels on the
01:09coast of Jamaica, especially concerned in the areas around Kingston, those harbors and on the
01:14south side of the island. Going to be a very, very significant wave action on top of that as well.
01:19Also expecting the possibility of life-threatening flooding due to heavy rainfall and the potential
01:23for devastating impacts if the eyewall of barrel moves over the island. In terms of the timing of
01:29arrival of those tropical storm force winds, expecting them to begin tonight or later today
01:34and tonight along the southern coast of Hispaniola, reaching Jamaica early tomorrow morning. So for
01:40folks in Jamaica, you have today to complete your preparations, follow any advice you've been given
01:45by local officials to get prepared or potential evacuations. You want to be in your safe place
01:50where you're going to ride out the storm by nightfall tonight and be prepared to stay in that
01:54location through the day on Wednesday. Cayman Islands, we're looking at the arrival of tropical
01:58storm force winds Wednesday evening into Wednesday night. Western Cuba would be during the day
02:03Thursday and Thursday evening in the Yucatan Peninsula of Mexico. On the rainfall front,
02:09very concerned about heavy rainfall. This is a big hazard in the Caribbean, especially with the
02:13mountainous islands, the areas of topography here. We could be looking at isolated amounts as high
02:18as six to eight inches in portions of the southwestern part of the Dominican Republic.
02:23Central Dominican Republic, six inches. Isolated amounts as high as 10 to 12 inches along the
02:27southwestern peninsula of Haiti. Isolated amounts as high as 12 inches in Jamaica as well, with
02:32widespread totals of four to eight inches. This could cause life-threatening flash floods and
02:36mudslides in some of these areas.