Diario Extra – Dorian already hits the east coast of the United States

Charleston, United States. AFP – North and South Carolina began Thursday to feel the force of torrential rains and the fierce winds brought by Hurricane Dorian as it approaches the east coast of the United States, after leaving devastation and causing at least 20 deaths as it passes through the Bahamas.

Downtown Charleston areas were flooded and some people kayaking the streets of this coastal city in South Carolina, according to video images that also show trees bent by the intense wind blowing from the sea.

Dozens of streets are closed due to the forecast of up to 50 centimeters of rain and flash floods.

According to the latest bulletin of the National Hurricane Center (NHC), Dorian, now category 3, was at 12:00 GMT 115 kilometers south-southeast of Charleston, moving along the coast in a northbound direction, with maximum sustained winds of 185 km / h

Hundreds of thousands of people in North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia and other places were under evacuation orders.

More than 80,000 customers were left without power in South Carolina, where 22 shelters for evacuees have been installed, the state emergency management agency said on Twitter.

In the Bahamas, an archipelago located between Florida, Cuba and Haiti, in the Caribbean Sea, the hurricane left at least 20 dead and a "generational devastation," according to Bahamian Prime Minister Hubert Minnis.

He also warned that looters will be punished "with the full weight of the law," and said additional security forces agents had been deployed.

The US Coast Guard and the British Royal Navy transported survivors and emergency supplies as flood waters receded in the Bahamas.

The United Nations said about 70,000 people in the Bahamas need "immediate help."

UN Deputy Secretary General for Humanitarian Affairs Mark Lowcock said after meeting with Minnis that shelters, drinking water, food and medicine are urgently needed for some 50,000 people in Grand Bahama and between 15,000 and 20,000 in Great Abaco.

"Speed ​​is essential," Red Cross official Stephen McAndrew said of rescue operations on the two northernmost islands of the archipelago, hit by one of the strongest storms ever recorded in the Atlantic.

In Grand Bahama, jet skis and boats were used to remove victims from houses flooded or destroyed by the storm.

American and British helicopters carried out medical evacuations, aerial evaluations to help coordinate relief efforts and reconnaissance flights to know the damage.

US President Donald Trump spoke by phone with Minnis and promised the assistance of his country, the White House said.

"A large part of the Bahamas was beaten in a way that few people had ever seen," Trump said. "They need a lot of help."

Aerial images showed catastrophic damage in Great Abaco, with hundreds of homes without roofs, submerged or overturned cars, huge floods, small boats with splinters and rubble everywhere.

– "Luck in Florida" –

The state of Florida was largely unharmed by Dorian.

"We were lucky in Florida. A lot, a lot of luck in fact," Trump said.

A potentially deadly storm surge with significant flooding is expected in large areas of the southeast coast of the country over the next few days, the NHC said.

Roberto Smith, who was born in Great Abaco but now lives in Florida, said he was worried about his family.

"I talked to my dad the night of the hurricane, Sunday night, and his roof flew," he told AFP. "I haven't talked to him since then. I'm really worried. I can't even eat."

"The island is devastated." "There is no electricity or running water."

– "The clock is running" –

The US Coast Guard said it had rescued 61 people, including 19 injured patients from the Marsh Harbor clinic on Great Abaco Island, who were transferred to Nassau on Tuesday.

USAID, the US aid agency, said it was sending supplies such as plastic sheets for shelters, hygiene kits and water from Miami.

Larry Lewis, who runs the Paradise Watersports store in the city of Freeport in Grand Bahama, said most of the floodwaters had receded but some roads were still impassable.

He said that very few stores were open. "I saw many people looking for leftovers to eat," he told AFP.

A British ship, the RFA Mounts Bay, launched boats with supplies for Marsh Harbor in the Great Abacus, and the UK Department of International Development said it had sent three humanitarian experts.

"The clock is running to help those in need," said British International Development Secretary Alok Sharma.

Dorian left up to 76 centimeters of rain over the Bahamas, a former British colony.