JAMAICA: Residents hunker down as Hurricane Dean passes the island

As Hurricane Dean barrels over Jamaica, the government declares a curfew and wary residents stay home to keep looters out. Jamaica declared a curfew on Sunday (August 19) as a fiercely powerful Hurricane Dean bore down on the island after killing five people earlier on its run through the Caribbean. The government opened shelters and urged residents of low-lying areas to evacuate. The hurricane was an "extremely dangerous" Category 4 storm, the second-highest on the five-step Saffir-Simpson scale, and could strengthen into a rare and potentially catastrophic Category 5 near Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula, the U.S. National Hurricane Centre said. Some residents of one low-lying seaport town close to Kingston refused to leave. Noel Clough, one such resident, claiming he stayed at home because of possible looting. "..., and the safety of our lives" he added from his front door. Jamaica's power company switched off power to most of the island but in Kingston it was still running. Campaigning for Aug. 27 elections was halted. Dean packed sustained winds of 145 miles per hour (230 km per hour) and its eye was about 80 miles (125 km) southeast of Kingston at 2 p.m. EDT (1800 GMT). Hurricane warnings were also in effect for the Cayman islands and parts of Haiti, and a tropical storm warning was issued for parts of Cuba and the Dominican Republic. Thousands of frightened tourists along Mexico's Caribbean coast stood in line for hours at airports to flee before Dean's expected arrival on Monday. Dean was moving west-northwest at 18 mph (30 kph) and was being watched closely by energy markets, which have been skittish since a series of storms in 2004 and 2005 toppled Gulf of Mexico oil rigs, flooded refineries and cut pipelines. The storm is expected to pass the Cayman Islands, a wealthy British territory, hit Mexico's Yucatan early in the week, and after that head into the central Mexican coast. Category 5 hurricanes are rare but in 2005 there were four, including Katrina, reinforcing research that suggests global warming may increase the strength of tropical cyclones.

ITN Source | August 20, 2007

Tags:. .arrival. .warming. .coast. .safety. .potentially