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Iris becomes a hurricane in Caribbean
By Times staff and wire reports
© St. Petersburg Times,
published October 7, 2001
BARAHONA, Dominican Republic -- Tropical Storm Iris strengthened into a hurricane Saturday, triggering mudslides that killed three people in the Dominican Republic and lashing Haiti with winds and rains as it threatened to hit Jamaica.
Iris is the first hurricane to threaten Caribbean islands this season.
Forecasters at the U.S. National Hurricane Center said Hurricane Iris is not expected to pose a threat to Florida. A very strong area of high pressure over the eastern United States is providing protection to the mainland and may do the same for a newly formed tropical depression several hundred miles behind Iris, said weather service meteorologist Hugh Cobb.
"It's acting as a blocking system, keeping everything to the south," Cobb said of the system.
Right now, it does not appear that the storms will be a threat to enter the Gulf of Mexico, though Cobb cautioned that the depression is still be too far out at sea to forecast with certainty.
The tropical depression, currently 500 miles east, southeast of Barbados, is expected to intensify into Tropical Storm Jerry within 12 to 24 hours.
On Saturday in the Dominican capital of Santo Domingo, heavy rain caused a mudslide that destroyed a home under construction. Parts of the collapsed structure slid and crushed a small house, killing all three inside -- a 27-year-old mother and her daughters, ages 8 and 3.
The home was in the hillside neighborhood of Los Girasoles in the capital's western outskirts, said Henry Peralta, spokesman for the Civil Defense Force. A separate mudslide in Los Girasoles also caused another house to collapse, slightly injuring two men.
Thirty-five families were evacuated from several low-lying neighborhoods as rivers swelled over their banks, he said. The storm dumped at least 3 inches of rain along the Dominican south coast.
At 8 p.m., Iris -- packing maximum sustained winds of 75 mph -- was moving west some 60 miles south of the island Hispaniola, divided between Haiti and the Dominican Republic. Hurricane-force winds extended 25 miles from the storm center. The storm was moving west-northwest at 17 mph.
Haiti posted a hurricane warning for its south coast and advised coastal residents and valley dwellers to move to higher ground.
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