NU Online News Service, Nov. 8, 3:22 p.m. EST
Haiti and Cuba were spared the full force of Hurricane Tomas over the weekend as the storm skirted the islands through the Windward Strait without making landfall.
The storm passed between Cuba and Haiti on Nov. 5 as a Category 1 hurricane without making landfall, according to a summary from Guy Carpenter's Instrat unit. The storm then tracked across the Turk and Caicos Islands as a tropical storm on Nov. 6.
Tomas passed around 10 miles from the westernmost point of Haiti and about 15 miles east of Cuba, the National Hurricane Center said. According to Guy Carpenter, "Forecasters said Haiti was subjected to the storm's strongest winds that were located to the north and east of the eyewall."
Haiti suffered some wind damage and heavy rain that triggered flooding, which caused some structural damage west of the capital, Port-au-Prince, Guy Carpenter said.
"Although it was a serious blow, officials said Haiti fared better than had been feared," Guy Carpenter said in a report on Tomas. "Prior to the storm's arrival, humanitarian organizations in the country had been concerned for the 1.5 million survivors of January's [7.0 magnitude] earthquake who are still living in tented camps vulnerable to strong winds and heavy rain."
Guy Carpenter said reports indicate the camps appeared to have withstood the weather better than expected.
Catastrophe modeler AIR Worldwide said Officials in Haiti worry that the flooding could worsen a cholera epidemic the country is dealing with. Officials believe the Artibonite River to be the prime source of the epidemic, AIR said, and that river was flooding after the heavy rains dumped by Tomas caused it to swell.
Guy Carpenter noted that Tomas caused moderate damage elsewhere in the Caribbean, including evacuations in the Dominican Republic and Jamaica and coastal flooding, landslides and moderate infrastructure damage in the eastern region of Cuba.
Tomas was the 19th named storm of the Atlantic hurricane season and the 12th hurricane.
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