Email

Print

And, there is concern in Belize because this country is within the storm cone. So, will it hit Belize? Well, it's too early to tell. Here's more from a NEMO press conference this afternoon in Belize city:

As a strong Category 4 storm, Hurricane Beryl bore down mercilessly on the Windward Islands this morning flattening small island communities - like this one outside Granada.

There has never been a Category 4 Storm in the month of June - and Belize has also never seen landfall from a hurricane in June.

Currently the storm is on track to make landfall north of Belize:

Ronald Gordon, Chief MET Officer
"The projected forecast for this hurricane is for it to move on a west-northwestward track across the southeastern Caribbean Sea for the remainder of the day Tuesday, enter the central Caribbean Sea just south of Jamaica around Wednesday and then move into the northwestern Caribbean Sea on Thursday."

"It is currently a category 4 hurricane almost at the strength of a category 5 with 150 miles per hour. The forecast calls for it to weaken as it enters the central Caribbean Sea, because it will it is forecast to encounter some wind shear which will disrupt its development and result in weakening."

"The system currently is moving as I said west -northwestward, it will encounter a high pressure ridge. At some point that will develop over the Gulf of Mexico forcing a more westward track. Just to make it simple for the public, a ridge is like a mountain the hurricane cannot move over a mountain, it tries to move around it, so that ridge will be blocking the system from moving farther northward and push it more on a westerly track after it moves near Jamaica."

"There is still a lot of uncertainty, this is a four to five day prediction that carries a lot of uncertainty. As you can see from the projected cone there is a hashed area near Belize indicating that there is a high level of uncertainty of where the system will be. However, the projected cone shows it anywhere from southern Belize, let's say from around the Stann Creek District up to the Northern Yucatan Peninsula. That means the center of the hurricane could be anywhere within that cone at that particular time, which is Friday morning. Intensity is also difficult to predict. The forecast is for it to weaken to a category one hurricane more or less by the time it reaches our area. However, we do know that intensive forecast can be very problematic. And looking at the situation, the wind shear is not that strong."

"So we do caution our residents to be aware and to do not take it lightly, to be very prepared for the system. If the system moves within the projected path, we will likely experience some impact from the system, including strong winds and heavy rainfall, which we'll be able to fine tune as the week goes on, as we get more information."

Jules Vasquez
"The consensus track between the model seems to be, and again, it's just a model, seems to be that it's making landfall in Chetumal or just north of Chetumal, maybe like Mahahual. That's what I saw this morning. If that were to happen, if, where is the strongest concentration of winds and water?"

Ronald Gordon, Chief MET Officer
"If indeed the system makes landfall in that area, of course, the stronger winds, storm surge, and so forth will be to the north of that area."

"Again, I must repeat, that is a big if. There is uncertainty, we have seen that the forecast track has shifted several times during the past few, at least, past 24 hours. At one point, it was showing more northern portions of Yucatan. Then it shifted south to include Belize once more. And that indicates, that fluctuation indicates uncertainty. The models are not resolving the steering flow properly. So there is a high level of uncertainty. So we cannot precisely see where to make landfall at this time."

So, the storm is four days out from likely making landfall somewhere in the Yucatan Peninsula - in that time a lot can happen and a lot can change - because it's a volatile system fuelled by very warm seas:

Ronald Gordon, Chief MET Officer
"The entire Atlantic and Caribbean basin are supercharged with hot water. So we have looked at the figures, where about two, sometimes up to almost three degrees Celsius above normal in terms of temperature. And like you rightly said, that is the energy that these systems need to fuel them. And that is precisely why the system was able to intensify so rapidly. And to add to that, of course, the prediction was going for an above average season and as you rightly mentioned, this hurricane is unprecedented in the fact that it is the first category four hurricane in history, in recorded history for the month of June. So certainly, it is uncharted waters in terms of that area."

And that volatility is what today had homeowners along the coast making early preparations. They got pounded by Lisa less than two years ago, and know that it's never too early too start to get ready - as they were doing today.

And while preparation is key - the models say this storm won't reach our area until Friday - and the National Coordinator says there's still time:

Ronald Gordon, Chief MET Officer
"We are projected that by tomorrow afternoon with the update that comes out at 3 p .m. we will have an idea if Belize will be directly impacted by the system or whether or not it will not be impacted directly. We are looking at possible impacts by as early as Thursday night. So if there is any evacuation of the islands, it will likely have to occur at least by Wednesday."

Daniel Mendez, NEMO -Nat'l Coordinator
"While we can't tell you to go out and start to purchase, what we can tell you is that make sure you have a plan, you know where to go. Again, with this great degree of uncertainty for us to say, yes, you need to go and purchase these things, that you need to go stock up, I think it would be too early to say."

"As the chief meteorologist had said, there's a large area of uncertainty. But we cannot wait until it's too late, and so we encourage early preparation to get these things done as soon as possible."