CHAPTER ONE A TASTE OF THINGS TO COME Elessa Harris 22 thought she knew hurricanes She lived on the small Caribbean island of Barbuda and hurricanes are a fact of life in that part of the world On September 5 2017 as Hurricane Irma approached she took shelter in her house like she had before She waited to ride out the storm Harris soon discovered Hurricane Irma was different The wind blew faster and faster Eventually it started lifting the roof right off her house Panicked she ran to a neighbor's home and hunkered down there for the rest of the storm When she and her neighbors emerged the next day they found their entire town Aerial photos revealed the scope of Irma's destruction in Barbuda
had been destroyed I have witnessed hurricanes before Harris said but nothing like this Weather authorities had been tracking Irma for days With winds reaching 185 miles per hour 296 kmh it was one of the most powerful hurricanes ever recorded in the Atlantic Barbuda was the first WHAT IS A HURRICANE inhabited area the storm struck CATASTROPHIC DAMAGE By the time Irma had moved on from Barbuda there was little left standing on the once pristine island The winds A hurricane is a rotating low pressure weather system with wind speeds at or exceeding 74 miles per hour 119 kmh The term hurricane comes from Hurakan the Mayan god of wind and storms Hurricanes originate in the Atlantic basin which includes the Atlantic Ocean the Caribbean Sea and the Gulf of Mexico The time of year in which most hurricanes occur is known as hurricane season It officially lasts from June 1 to November 30 though hurricanes can also form outside of this time frame The season peaks between August and October On average there are 12 hurricanes per year in the Atlantic basin Hurricanes also occur in other ocean basins In some parts of the world they have regionally specific names In the Northwest Pacific they are called typhoons But in the eastern North Pacific they are called hurricanes had snapped the island's only communications tower in half so telephone service was out As a result it took hours for news from the island to reach the outside world When it did it became clear the devastation was almost total
Roderick Faustin an official told the Los Angeles Times on September 7 that at least 95 percent of the properties on the 62 square mile 160 sq km island were either damaged BARBUDA Barbuda is part of the Leeward Islands chain in the eastern Caribbean It's located approximately 260 miles 420 km southeast of Puerto Rico and 110 miles 180 km north of Guadeloupe A coral island famous for its white sand beaches Barbuda rises to only 144 feet 44 m at its highest point Along with the larger island of Antigua located 39 miles 62 km to the south Barbuda is part of the nation of Antigua and Barbuda The country's population is more than 90 000 Most of those people live on Antigua Prior to Hurricane Irma Barbuda was home to approximately 1 700 people or totally destroyed That included the schools the only hospital the airport and two hotels NO ONE LEFT Although humanitarian aid began to arrive on the island immediately after the storm the destruction was so complete that the government decided to evacuate the entire remaining population In total 1 700 people were taken from Barbuda to Antigua A state of emergency was declared For the first time in 300 years there is not a single living person on the island of Barbuda Ronald Sanders the Antigua and Barbuda
