Puerto Rico Governor: Seek higher ground immediately, evacuate now!

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EArthern
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The 1920s Earthen Dam in Puerto Rico is about to collapse altogether. It’s a key dam northwest of San Juan, Puerto Rico and has failed.

Some 70,000 people were ordered to evacuate their homes Friday after a rain-swollen dam in Puerto Rico failed in the latest disaster caused by Hurricane Maria.

With the death toll from the storm at 33 across the Caribbean, the National Weather Service office in capital San Juan issued a flash flood warning for people living along the Guajataca River

“All Areas surrounding the Guajataca River should evacuate NOW. Their lives are in DANGER!,” the service said in a tweet. Flooding has already begun downstream, it said.

Shortly thereafter, Governor Ricardo Rossello issued an order for some 70,000 people living in the area in the northwest of the island to get out.

According to the newspaper El Vocero, Public Safety Secretary Hector Pesquera said a drain that normally releases a stream of water from the dam in a controlled fashion had broken.

After almost a year of working to pull itself from what was considered a fiscal death spiral, Puerto Rico finds itself in a vortex of a humanitarian crisis wrought by Hurricane Maria.

The island is grappling with massive destruction and near total loss of power, flooded towns and reports of fatalities. And though the storm had long departed, the tragedy and hardship continued Friday when the National Weather Service warned that a key dam northwest of San Juan had failed.

The National Weather Service in San Juan said the northwestern communities of Isabela, Quebradillas, and the surrounding areas were in danger. The approximately 70,000 people who live in the area were warned to seek higher ground immediately, as the failure of the 345-yard dam threatened to create flash flooding downstream on the Rio Guajataca.

About the author

Avatar of Juergen T Steinmetz

Juergen T Steinmetz

Juergen Thomas Steinmetz has continuously worked in the travel and tourism industry since he was a teenager in Germany (1977).
He founded eTurboNews in 1999 as the first online newsletter for the global travel tourism industry.

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