How to Gauge Whether Irma Will Be an Insurance Catastrophe

Hurricane conditions are expected to continue within the north central coastal area through Saturday, according to the U.S. National Hurricane Center. The region has yet to fully recover, with many homes still being repaired.

Cuba started evacuating residents and some of the 51,000 tourists visiting the island, particularly 36,000 people at resorts on the northern coast, a lot of them Canadians.

Canadian airlines have been sending planes to the Dominican Republic as well as Turks and Caicos to bring people back to Canada ahead of the storm – but passengers have struggled to get on them. The Cuban Government has prioritized evacuation from the cayos (or islands) where we now have customers: Cayo Coco and Cayo Santa Maria.

There’s an air of anxiety as residents prepare for the worst, but there is also an awareness that the government is there to oversee the disaster management through Cuba’s well-oiled Civil Defense (DC) system.

But the city had little to offer those who took him up on the offer.

“However, we have solid plans and we will all be sheltered for the duration of the storm”, said Inskeep.

A British naval ship has been deployed to help deal with the aftermath of the storm with 40 Royal Marines on board, as well as army engineers and equipment. “We’re going to hunker down, and it looks like we’re going to have to ride this one out”.

The Desir family wait next to their house as they prepare to go to a shelter to await the arrival of Hurricane Irma, in Cap-Haitien, on September 7, 2017. One river in particular, located on the outskirts of Cap-Haitien in the city of Haut-du-Cap, anxious her. “Of course, we will be monitoring for flooding and associated power outages”.

“When they evacuate you, you don’t argue. We have been calling from yesterday afternoon”, she said. CRS and partners in Caritas and Haitian dioceses had pre-positioned supplies and personnel to respond to the storm, she said.

“We haven’t seen any equipment”.

“They seem annoyed with all the people”, she said.

Haitian Interior Minister Max Rudolph Saint-Albin said the money had been sent to the bank accounts of the various mayors.

Emergency shelter at Etienne Saintil school in Port-de-Paix. “We don’t have the time”.

Cuba’s civil defence was mobilized on Tuesday against the threat of the approaching category 5 Hurricane Irma. “For this reason, the government has made a decision to trigger the biggest alert level the Red Alert from Wednesday 8 am for the entire country”, declared Prime Minister Jack Guy Lafontant. It’s like standing behind a jet engine!

Travellers are caught in the chaos as tensions mount with Hurricane Irma’s arrival in the Caribbean, says one Calgary woman.