Hurricane Beryl, which strengthened to Category 4 in the Caribbean, is “extremely dangerous”

Beryl, the first hurricane of the 2024 Atlantic season, was moving toward the southeastern Caribbean on Sunday, June 30, 2024, while Residents urged to finalize preparations ahead of landfall of ‘extremely dangerous’ Category 4 storm.

>>>There is a yellow alert in La Guajira for Hurricane Beryl, which has already reached category 4

The United States National Hurricane Center (NHC) warned that Beryl, which is currently moving in the Atlantic Ocean about 400 kilometers southeast of Barbados, is creating a “very dangerous situation” and asked residents of the region to attend to the instructions from their governments and emergency management.

“The storm is now an extremely dangerous Category 4 hurricane,” the Miami-based center said, noting that the eye of the storm is expected to reach the Windward Islands early Monday, an archipelago that includes Martinique, St. Lucia and Granada, among others.

St. Vincent and the Grenadines, as well as Grenada, were at greatest risk of being in the center of the storm’s core as of early Monday, the NHC said.

Beryl will produce “potentially catastrophic hurricane-force winds, life-threatening storm surge and damaging waves”the NHC predicted.

Barbados, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Grenada and Tobago are under hurricane warningwhile a tropical storm warning is in effect over Martinique, Dominica and Trinidad.

In Bridgetown, the capital of Barbados, cars lined up at gas stations, while supermarkets and grocery stores were packed with buyers of food, water and other supplies.

“Pending” of Hurricane Beryl in Mexico

According to experts, such a powerful storm at the start of the hurricane season, which runs from early June to late November in the Atlantic, is extremely rare.

“Only five major hurricanes (category 3+) have been recorded in the Atlantic before the first week of July. Beryl would be the sixth and the one with the earliest appearance at this end of the tropical Atlantic,” hurricane expert Michael wrote in Lowry.

According to the planned trajectory, after traveling through the Caribbean islands, Beryl would impact early Tuesday morning in the Mexican state of Quintana Roo (east), where the resorts of Cancun and the Riviera Maya are located.

“We are pending Civil Protection, the Secretariats of Defense and the Navy… observing the entire trajectory. According to the forecasts, it would enter until Thursday or Friday,” said the Mexican president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, in brief statements to the press on a work tour in Cancun.

“For the moment, it does not represent a danger to Mexican territory,” the National Meteorological Service said earlier.

Tropical Storm Alberto, the first of the season in the Atlantic, left at least five people dead as it passed through northern Mexico ten days ago.

5 meter waves

“It is very likely that the state of the sea will be very rough starting Sunday afternoon, and especially during Monday,” anticipated the meteorological services of the French State in Martinique.

Waves of 5 metres are expected in the Saint-Lucie Channel, south of the French island.

Beryl was the second named tropical phenomenon since early June in the Atlantic basin and is now the first hurricane.

Météo France predicts that the 2024 hurricane season will be “one of the most intense” in this area.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) also forecast an extraordinary season in late May, predicting the possibility of four to seven Category 3 or higher hurricanes.

The agency cited warm temperatures in the Atlantic Ocean and conditions associated with the La Niña weather phenomenon in the Pacific to explain the increase in storms.

In recent years, extreme weather events, including hurricanes, have become more frequent and devastating as a result of climate change.

>>>Hurricane Beryl strengthens and becomes category 3, according to Ideam: will it impact Colombia?