Hurricane Beryl roars toward Mexico after killing at least 7 people in the southeast Caribbean

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PLAYA DEL CARMEN, Mexico (AP) — Hurricane Beryl ripped roofs off homes in Jamaica, wreaked havoc on fishing boats in Barbados and damaged or destroyed 95 percent of homes on two islands in St. Vincent and the Grenadines before barreling toward the Cayman Islands and targeting Mexico’s Caribbean coast after leaving at least seven dead.

The first storm to develop into a Category 5 hurricane in the Atlantic has weakened slightly but remains a major hurricane. The eye of the storm is expected to pass just south of the Cayman Islands overnight.

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Mexico’s famous Caribbean coastlines have set up shelters, evacuated some small, remote coastal communities and even moved sea turtle eggs from beaches threatened by storms, but in nightlife hotspots like Playa del Carmen and Tulum, tourists are still spending another night on the town.

The Mexican Navy patrolled areas such as Tulum and told tourists in Spanish and English to prepare for the storm’s arrival.

As of late Wednesday evening, the storm’s center was about 560 miles (905 kilometers) east-southeast of Tulum, Mexico. It had maximum sustained winds of 130 mph (215 kph) and was moving west-northwest at 21 mph (32 kph). Beryl is expected to make landfall in a sparsely populated area of ​​lagoons and mangroves south of Tulum in the early hours of Friday morning, possibly as a Category 2 storm. It is then expected to cross the Yucatan Peninsula and regain strength over the warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico to hit Mexico’s northeastern coast near the Texas border.

The storm has already shown its destructive potential across a long swath of the southeastern Caribbean.

Hurricane Beryl hit the south coast of Jamaica on Wednesday afternoon, knocking out power and ripping off roofs. Prime Minister Andrew Holness said Jamaica had not seen “the worst that could happen.”

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“We can do what we can, as much as we humanly can, and leave the rest in God’s hands,” Holness said.

Several roads in Jamaica’s interior were affected by downed trees and utility poles, while some communities in the northern part were without power, according to the government information agency.

Perhaps the worst happened earlier in Beryl’s path when it struck two small islands in the Lesser Antilles.

About 95 percent of homes in Mairu and Union Island were damaged by Hurricane Beryl, said Michelle Forbes, director of the National Emergency Management Organization in St. Vincent and the Grenadines.

Officials said three people died in Grenada and Carriacou and one in St. Vincent and the Grenadines. Officials said three more people died in northern Venezuela, where four people were missing.

One death occurred after a tree fell on a house, Grenada’s Environment Minister Keren James told The Associated Press.

St. Vincent and the Grenadines Prime Minister Ralph Gonsalves has pledged to rebuild the archipelago.

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The last major hurricane to hit the southeastern Caribbean was Hurricane Ivan 20 years ago, which killed dozens of people in Grenada.

In Cancun on Wednesday afternoon, Donna MacNaughton, a 43-year-old cardiologist from Scotland, was taking the approaching storm with aplomb.

Her flight home wasn’t until Monday, so she planned to follow the hotel’s advice to wait.

“We’re not too scared. It will settle down,” she said. “We’re used to the wind and rain in Scotland anyway.”

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Associated Press journalists John Myers Jr. and Renloy Traill in Kingston, Jamaica, Mark Stevenson and Maria Verza in Mexico City, Coral Murphy Marcus in San Juan, Puerto Rico, and Lucanus Olivier in Kingstown, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, contributed to this report.

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