Tag: Caribbean

Category 5 Hurricane Beryl pummels Caribbean, hurtles towards Jamaica

By Chandan KHANNA BRIDGETOWN/ST. GEORGE’S, Barbados, July 2, 2024 (AFP) – Hurricane Beryl was Tuesday hurtling towards Jamaica as it strengthened into a record top-level Category 5 storm after sweeping across several islands in the southeastern Caribbean. Dumping heavy rain and unleashing devastating winds, Beryl was described as a “potentially catastrophic” storm by the US National Hurricane Center (NHC). One person was killed in the Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, the country’s government said, while […]

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Caribbean braces as Hurricane Beryl strengthens to ‘very dangerous’ storm

By Chandan KHANNA BRIDGETOWN, Barbados, June 30, 2024 (AFP) – Beryl, the first hurricane of the 2024 Atlantic season, strengthened into a “very dangerous” Category 3 storm Sunday morning as it threatened the southeast Caribbean with potential life-threatening winds and storm surge, US forecasters said. The US National Hurricane Center (NHC) said Beryl — currently churning in the Atlantic Ocean about 420 miles (675 kilometers) east of Barbados — “continues to quickly strengthen this Sunday […]

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French navy seizes 2.4 tonnes of cocaine from Atlantic fishing boat

PARIS, May 27, 2024 (AFP) – The French navy has seized 2.4 tonnes of cocaine from a Venezuelan fishing boat in the Atlantic, authorities said Monday. Acting on a tipoff from the customs department, a helicopter from the frigate Ventose landed a team on the fishing boat about 1,500 kilometres northeast of the Caribbean island of Martinique, France’s Caribbean Armed Services department said. The boat, the crew and the cocaine were handed over to Venezuelan […]

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43 million went hungry in Latam, Caribbean last year: UN

SANTIAGO, Nov 9, 2023 (AFP) – Hunger affected some 43.2 million people in Latin America and the Caribbean in 2022, about 6.5 percent of the region’s population, the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization said Thursday. While an improvement from 2021, the figure was higher than pre-Covid — representing some six million extra hungry people from 2019, the agency said in a regional overview of food security and nutrition. The FAO cited the pandemic, the climate […]

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‘It just dies’: Yellow-band disease ravages Thailand’s coral reefs

BAN KO SAMAESAN, Thailand (AFP) – Underneath the calm turquoise waters off eastern Thailand, a rapidly spreading disease is killing corals over vast stretches of the sea floor, and scientists fear it may be getting worse because of climate change. Yellow-band disease — named for the color it turns corals before destroying them — was first spotted decades ago and has caused widespread damage to reefs in the Caribbean. There is no known cure. But it […]

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Haiti reports first deaths from cholera in three years

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AFP) – At least seven people in Haiti have died from cholera, authorities said Sunday, raising fresh fears of a resurgent epidemic in the crisis-wracked Caribbean nation. Cholera killed around 10,000 people in the wake of Haiti’s 2010 earthquake, when United Nations workers helping the response introduced it to the country. Nearly three years after Haiti’s last confirmed case of the illness, the country’s health ministry on Sunday said multiple suspected cases had […]

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Volcano spewing ash, hot gravel on Caribbean island of St Vincent

  by Gemma Handy Agence France Presse Ash and hot gravel rained down Friday on the Caribbean island of Saint Vincent, after powerful eruptions from a volcano that had been dormant for decades sent thousands of panicked locals fleeing to safety. The initial blast from La Soufriere, the highest peak in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, sent plumes of hot ash and smoke 6,000 meters (20,000 feet) into the air Friday morning, the local emergency […]

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More than 10 million virus cases in Latin America, Caribbean: AFP tally

  By Agence France Presse More than 10 million cases of the new coronavirus have been recorded in Latin America and the Caribbean according to an AFP tally at 0640 GMT based on official sources. A total of 10,001,833 cases have now been recorded, of whom 366,637 people have died and 8,537,563 are considered to be cured. According to official figures, the region is the worst hit by the virus in the world in terms […]

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Latin America and Caribbean record 500,000 virus cases

  Latin America and the Caribbean have recorded more than half a million coronavirus infections, according to an AFP tally based on official reports. Almost half have been recorded in Brazil — the country worst-hit by the pandemic in the region — which also has more than 15,000 deaths. The tallies, using data collected by AFP from national authorities and information from the World Health Organization (WHO), probably reflect only a fraction of the actual […]

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Magnitude 7.7 quake hits Caribbean, triggering evacuations; tremors felt as far as US mainland

MIAMI, United States (AFP) — A major 7.7 magnitude quake struck Tuesday in the Caribbean between Jamaica and Cuba, triggering a brief tsunami alert and sending hundreds of people pouring onto the streets of Havana. The tremors were felt as far as the US mainland as police in Miami evacuated some buildings as a precaution. The US Geological Survey said the quake hit at a depth of 10 kilometers (six miles), at 1910 GMT — […]

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Global air traffic at new record: UN agency

MONTREAL, Canada (AFP) – Budget carriers continued to push global air traffic to new record levels last year, the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) said on Wednesday. Scheduled air services carried “a new record” of 4.1 billion passengers in 2017, an increase of 7.1 percent over the previous year, ICAO said, citing preliminary data. The figure compares with six percent growth in 2016. “The sustainability of the tremendous growth in international civil air traffic is demonstrated by […]

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Hurricane-hit Puerto Rico launches new drive for US statehood

WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — Hurricane-ravaged Puerto Rico on Wednesday launched a new drive to become the 51st US state, with the island’s governor demanding an end to “second-class” treatment of its citizens. Puerto Rico’s more than three million residents are US citizens, with no obstacles to living and working on the mainland. Yet the US commonwealth in the Caribbean has just a non-voting delegation in the US Congress in Washington, and Puerto Rico residents […]

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