Miami: US President Donald Trump on Thursday cancelled a trip to Poland as Hurricane Dorian bore down on Florida, where it could make landfall as a dangerous Category 4 storm.
Trump, who had been scheduled to attend Second World War anniversary commemorations in Poland this weekend, said he would focus instead on preparations for the approaching hurricane.
“Our highest priority is the safety and security of the people in the path of the hurricane,” he told reporters in the White House Rose Garden.
Vice President Mike Pence would go to Poland in his place, Trump said.
In Florida, residents stocked up on bottled water, groceries and gasoline as Hurricane Dorian gathered strength and churned across the Atlantic Ocean on a collision course with the southern US state.
Weather forecasters said Dorian, currently a Category 1 storm — the lowest on a five-level scale — could make landfall as a powerful Category 4 hurricane with the potential to cause life-threatening storm surges.
Florida’s governor declared a state of emergency in all 67 of the state’s counties, warning the millions of people who live up and down the eastern coast of the “Sunshine State” to prepare for a potentially major hurricane.
“All Floridians really need to monitor Hurricane Dorian and make the necessary preparations,” Governor Ron DeSantis said. “Have your plan and make those preparations right now.”
“The risk of devastating hurricane-force winds along the Florida east coast and peninsula late this weekend and early next week continues to increase,” the National Hurricane Center (NHC) warned.
Trump, who has properties including the Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, a politically important state for his 2020 re-election bid, also warned Floridians to get ready.
“Be prepared... it will be a very big Hurricane, perhaps one of the biggest!” he said on Twitter.
The US Coast Guard said ocean-going commercial vessels should make plans to depart South Florida ports.
Grocery stores were full of shoppers making last-minute purchases of water, food, propane canisters and other supplies. There were lines at some gasoline stations as drivers filled up their tanks.
A Rolling Stones concert originally scheduled for Saturday night was moved up by a day “due to the weather forecast,” the band’s Twitter account said.
In its latest advisory, the NHC said Dorian was a Category 1 hurricane with maximum sustained winds of 140 kilometres per hour.
It was located about 330 miles east of the southeastern Bahamas, and moving at 13 miles per hour on a northwest track towards Florida, where it was forecast to make landfall on Monday.
“Strengthening is forecast during the next few days, and Dorian is expected to become a major hurricane on Friday, and remain an extremely dangerous hurricane through the weekend,” the NHC said.
The US territory of Puerto Rico, still recovering from a powerful storm two years ago, was largely spared from Dorian but the NHC said it could dump up to 18 centimetres of rain on some parts of the Bahamas.
Puerto Rico spared
In Puerto Rico, the new governor, Wanda Vazquez, gave the all clear, but there was no let-up in the political storm involving Trump and Carmen Yulin Cruz, the mayor of San Juan, the island’s capital.
“Now that Dorian is going to the east coast let us hope that @realDonaldTrump sets aside his prejudice and racism & moves the federal response to efficiency,” the San Juan mayor tweeted.
Trump declared a state of emergency in Puerto Rico ahead of Hurricane Dorian, authorizing federal assistance, but alleged that the island is “one of the most corrupt places on earth” and its political system is “broken.”
Puerto Rico was devastated in 2017 by Hurricane Maria, a Category 4 storm.
A study accepted as valid by the government, which initially put the death toll at 64, estimated that nearly 3,000 people died as a result of the hurricane and the months of disruption that followed.
