'Total devastation': Aerial images show Hurricane Dorian's trail of destruction
Devastating images have emerged after Hurricane Dorian destroyed thousands of homes, killing at least five people, crippling hospitals and leaving parts of the Bahamas in ruin.
Dorian pounded the northern Abaco Islands and Grand Bahama with winds up to 295 km/h and torrential rain before finally moving into open waters Tuesday on a course for Florida. Its winds were down to a still-dangerous 175 km/h, making it a Category 2 storm.
More than five people have been reported dead.
Images show the total destruction the storm caused.
Lawson Bates, who works for aid group MedicCorps, flew over Abaco following Dorian.
“It looks completely flattened,” he said.
“There’s boats way inland that are flipped over. It’s total devastation.”
Homes in Marsh Harbor were completely destroyed.
The Grand Bahama airport was under two metres of water.
Bahamas hit with 890mm of rain
Health Minister Duane Sands said Dorian rendered the main hospital on Grand Bahama unusable, while the hospital in Marsh Harbor in Abaco was in need of food, water, medicine and surgical supplies.
Mr Sands said crews were trying to airlift five to seven kidney failure patients from Abaco who had not received dialysis since Friday.
NASA satellite imagery through Monday night showed some places in the Bahamas had received as much as 89 centimetres (890mm) of rain, private meteorologist Ryan Maue said.
Lia Head-Rigby, who runs a local hurricane relief organisation, said many buildings will have to be completely rebuilt.
“It’s decimated. Apocalyptic. It looks like a bomb went off,” she said.
She said her representative on Abaco Islands told her that “there’s a lot more dead” and that the bodies were being gathered.
Woman's incredible act to save 97 dogs from Hurricane Dorian
'Pure hell': Catastrophic Hurricane Dorian wreaks 'absolute devastation'
Emergency authorities struggled to reach victims amid conditions too dangerous even for rescue workers, and urged people to hang on.
Evacuations on Florida, Georgia and Carolina coasts
More than two million people along the coast in Florida, Georgia and North and South Carolina were warned to evacuate.
While the threat of a direct hit on Florida had all but evaporated, Dorian is expected to pass dangerously close to Georgia and South Carolina — and perhaps strike North Carolina — on Thursday or Friday.
More than 13,000 Bahamas homes badly damaged
In the Bahamas, Red Cross spokesman Matthew Cochrane said more than 13,000 houses, or about 45 per cent of the homes on Grand Bahama and Abaco, were believed to have been severely damaged or destroyed.
UN officials said more than 60,000 people on the hard-hit islands will need food, and the Red Cross said some 62,000 will need clean drinking water.
“What we are hearing lends credence to the fact that this has been a catastrophic storm and a catastrophic impact,” Mr Cochrane said.
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