Four men and three women were taken to hospitals, officials said. Their ages were not immediately clear.
A building adjacent to the site of the explosion was being evacuated, fire officials said.
Video from the scene showed debris strewn across the sidewalk, street and several cars. Windows were blown out of the building, which had extensive damage to its top floor.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
Six men and two women were taken to hospitals, officials said. Their ages were not immediately clear.
A building adjacent to the site of the explosion was being evacuated, fire officials said.
Video from the scene showed debris strewn across the sidewalk, street and several cars. Windows were blown out of the building, which had extensive damage to its top floor.
Crews for local gas utility Peoples Gas did not smell any gas at the site, a spokesperson for the company said.
“The cause of the incident is unknown, but there is no reason at this point to believe the cause is related to gas or any of our equipment,” the spokesperson said in a statement.
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and the Chicago Police Bomb Squad were also responding to investigate, the Chicago Fire Department said.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
(NEW YORK) — Hurricane Fiona strengthened to a Category 3 storm Tuesday after leaving the entire island of Puerto Rico without power.
The storm system is currently carrying sustained winds of 115 mph as it moves northwest near Turks and Caicos. It could become a Category 4 storm as it closes in on Bermuda later in the week.
Fiona made a second landfall Monday in the Dominican Republic near Boca de Yuma on the eastern side of the island with sustained winds of 90 mph and even higher gusts.
On Monday, the hurricane moved over the Dominican Republic with damaging winds and rain, causing more flash flooding and hurricane warnings in the region.
At least one person was killed in Puerto Rico as the then-Category 1 storm slammed the island, officials announced Monday.
The Arecibo resident was attempting to fill his generator with gasoline while it was on, causing an ignition, officials said.
Puerto Rico Gov. Pedro Pierluisi warned residents that more rain is expected on the island through Tuesday evening.
“We are going through a difficult moment but our people are strong and very generous,” he said during a press conference.
At least two more people died in a shelter due to natural causes, but those have not been labeled as storm-related deaths, Pierluisi said.
Restoring power in Puerto Rico
LUMA Energy said that only 100,000 out of 1.5 million clients have power on the island.
The governor said Monday the goal is for “a large number of LUMA customers” to have power “in a matter of days.” However, LUMA said in a statement Sunday that “full power restoration could take several days.”
Hospitals on the island are currently operating on generators, according to the governor.
Only 34% of households on the island have potable water after rivers grew and heavy rainfall impacted the system — meaning more than 834,000 people are without drinking water, the governor said Monday.
More than 1,000 people have been rescued by authorities, including a woman rescued Sunday who was stuck in a tree for seven hours after trying to look at the damage, officials said.
Heavy rainfall causes flooding across the island
Fiona strengthened to a hurricane from a tropical storm Sunday morning. The National Hurricane Center said Fiona made landfall in southwestern Puerto Rico on Sunday at 3:20 p.m. ET, dumping torrential rain on much of the island.
Some regions measured up to 25 inches of rain by 8 a.m. Monday, and flash flood warnings remain in effect for much of the island, according to the National Hurricane Center.
A flash flood emergency was issued overnight due to many rivers rising very quickly out of their banks. The Rio Grande de Arecido river rose 13 feet in one hour.
A bridge near Utuado, a town in the central mountainous region of the island, has collapsed, cutting off the communities of Salto Arriba and Guaonico, local newspaper El Vocero de Puerto Rico reported.
The portion of the bridge that collapsed is on Highway 123, a branch of Highway 10, which serves as a link between both roads and is one of the accesses to the University of Puerto Rico at Utuado campus, according to El Vocero.
The bridge, installed by the National Guard following Hurricane Maria, cost about $3 million to construct, the newspaper reported.
The rain saturated areas in the southeastern part of Puerto Rico, along with the mountainous areas, where potential mudslides and winds could cause the most damage.
Prior to landfall, Pierluisi said Puerto Rico was prepared as it could be, with enough resources and manpower in place to respond — adding that the island learned its lessons from the devastating effects of Hurricane Maria in September 2017.
“We’re much in a much better position than we were five years ago,” he said.
Where Fiona heads next
After passing through the Caribbean, the storm system will head northward, passing just east of Turks and Caicos before tracking near Bermuda, forecasts show. The storm system will continue to gradually strengthen in the coming days as it moves north and then northeast this week.
Forecasts place Fiona near Turks and Caicos Monday night into Tuesday morning as a strong Category 2 hurricane with winds near 100 mph.
Tremendous rainfall is forecast, with much of the Dominican Republic expected to receive up to 10 inches and some regions in Turks and Caicos expected to see 8 inches of rain.
On Tuesday morning, Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic will continue to see gradually improving conditions, however, lingering showers and thunderstorms will still be likely, potentially impacting initial cleanup and recovery efforts.
By mid-week, Fiona is forecast to become the first major hurricane of 2022 Atlantic season, with winds of up to 125 mph.
Winds could be as high as 125 mph as the storm passes near Bermuda, bringing strong winds, heavy rain and storm surge. Some models show the storm hitting Bermuda directly on Friday.
While it won’t make landfall in the U.S., the hurricane will affect the entire East Coast with huge waves, rip currents and coastal flooding from Florida to Maine as it moves northward.
President Joe Biden approved an emergency declaration for Puerto Rico on Sunday, which allows federal agencies to coordinate all relief efforts.
Biden’s decision has the “purpose of alleviating the hardship and suffering caused by the emergency on the local population, and to provide appropriate assistance for required emergency measures, authorized under Title V of the Stafford Act, to save lives and to protect property and public health and safety, and to lessen or avert the threat of a catastrophe in all 78 municipalities in the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico,” the White House said in a statement.
(NEW YORK) — Hurricane Fiona has strengthened to a Category 2 storm after leaving the entire island of Puerto Rico without power.
The storm system is currently carrying sustained winds of 110 mph as it moves northwest at 10 mph. The hurricane is gaining strength as it heads toward Turks and Caicos and could even escalate to a Category 3 by the time it hits in less than 24 hours.
Fiona made another landfall overnight in the Dominican Republic near Boca de Yuma on the eastern side of the island with sustained winds of 90 mph and even higher gusts.
On Monday morning, the hurricane was moving over the Dominican Republic with damaging winds and rain, causing more flash flooding and hurricane warnings in the region.
At least one person was killed in Puerto Rico as the then-Category 1 storm slammed the island, officials announced Monday.
The Arecibo resident was attempting to fill his generator with gasoline while it was on, causing an ignition, officials said.
Puerto Rico Gov. Pedro Pierluisi warned residents that more rain is expected on the island through Tuesday evening.
“We are going through a difficult moment but our people are strong and very generous,” he said during a press conference.
At least two more people died in a shelter due to natural causes, but those have not been labeled as storm-related deaths, Pierluisi said.
Restoring power in Puerto Rico
LUMA Energy said that only 100,000 out of 1.5 million clients have power on the island.
The governor said Monday the goal is for “a large number of LUMA customers” to have power “in a matter of days.” However, LUMA said in a statement Sunday that “full power restoration could take several days.”
Hospitals on the island are currently operating on generators, according to the governor.
Only 34% of households on the island have potable water after rivers grew and heavy rainfall impacted the system — meaning more than 834,000 people are without drinking water, the governor said Monday.
More than 1,000 people have been rescued by authorities, including a woman rescued Sunday who was stuck in a tree for seven hours after trying to look at the damage, officials said.
Heavy rainfall causes flooding across the island
Fiona strengthened to a hurricane from a tropical storm Sunday morning. The National Hurricane Center said Fiona made landfall in southwestern Puerto Rico on Sunday at 3:20 p.m. ET, dumping torrential rain on much of the island.
Some regions measured up to 25 inches of rain by 8 a.m. Monday, and flash flood warnings remain in effect for much of the island, according to the National Hurricane Center.
A flash flood emergency was issued overnight due to many rivers rising very quickly out of their banks. The Rio Grande de Arecido river rose 13 feet in one hour.
A bridge near Utuado, a town in the central mountainous region of the island, has collapsed, cutting off the communities of Salto Arriba and Guaonico, local newspaper El Vocero de Puerto Rico reported.
The portion of the bridge that collapsed is on Highway 123, a branch of Highway 10, which serves as a link between both roads and is one of the accesses to the University of Puerto Rico at Utuado campus, according to El Vocero.
The bridge, installed by the National Guard following Hurricane Maria, cost about $3 million to construct, the newspaper reported.
The rain saturated areas in the southeastern part of Puerto Rico, along with the mountainous areas, where potential mudslides and winds could cause the most damage.
Prior to landfall, Pierluisi said Puerto Rico was prepared as it could be, with enough resources and manpower in place to respond — adding that the island learned its lessons from the devastating effects of Hurricane Maria in September 2017.
“We’re much in a much better position than we were five years ago,” he said.
Where Fiona heads next
After passing through the Caribbean, the storm system will head northward, passing just east of Turks and Caicos before tracking near Bermuda, forecasts show. The storm system will continue to gradually strengthen in the coming days as it moves north and then northeast this week.
Forecasts place Fiona near Turks and Caicos Monday night into Tuesday morning as a strong Category 2 hurricane with winds near 100 mph.
Tremendous rainfall is forecast, with much of the Dominican Republic expected to receive up to 10 inches and some regions in Turks and Caicos expected to see 8 inches of rain.
On Tuesday morning, Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic will continue to see gradually improving conditions, however, lingering showers and thunderstorms will still be likely, potentially impacting initial cleanup and recovery efforts.
By mid-week, Fiona is forecast to become the first major hurricane of 2022 Atlantic season, with winds of up to 125 mph.
Winds could be as high as 125 mph as the storm passes near Bermuda, bringing strong winds, heavy rain and storm surge. Some models show the storm hitting Bermuda directly on Friday.
While it won’t make landfall in the U.S., the hurricane will affect the entire East Coast with huge waves, rip currents and coastal flooding from Florida to Maine as it moves northward.
President Joe Biden approved an emergency declaration for Puerto Rico on Sunday, which allows federal agencies to coordinate all relief efforts.
Biden’s decision has the “purpose of alleviating the hardship and suffering caused by the emergency on the local population, and to provide appropriate assistance for required emergency measures, authorized under Title V of the Stafford Act, to save lives and to protect property and public health and safety, and to lessen or avert the threat of a catastrophe in all 78 municipalities in the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico,” the White House said in a statement.
Fiona leaves 1 dead in Guadeloupe
While still a tropical storm, the system battered other Caribbean islands. One person died in the French territory of Guadeloupe, according to The Associated Press. More than 20 others were rescued amid heavy wind and rain according to the AP.
Fiona’s center moved through the island of Guadeloupe on Friday night, bringing heavy rain and gusty winds across the Leeward Islands.
The island’s emergency management office in Puerto Rico even had a blackout during its Saturday morning press conference. Pierluisi reiterated during that press briefing Saturday evening that the fear is that heavy rains will produce mudslides.
Resident Magda Diaz told ABC News outside a San Juan Walmart that she expects to be without power. Diaz said she loses power regularly, especially during smaller storms, and was recently in the dark for three days.
A LUMA Energy official told ABC News on Saturday that the company has been fixing the grid and is ready to get the grid back online if the system fails. LUMA Energy is in charge of the transmission and distribution of electricity on the island.
“We were expecting power outages from Fiona … and we’re bringing in 100 more workers from our parent companies that will be landing Sunday,” LUMA official Don Cortez said.
LUMA Energy’s Crisis Management Manager Abner Gomez told reporters the energy distributor is working to prevent a repeat of Hurricane Maria’s aftermath.
“We are going to make sure [a widespread outage] will not happen because we have the crews,” he said. “There will be damage. There will be outages and we will be ready to respond.”
ABC News’ Daniel Amarante, Rachel DeLima, Kenton Gewecke, Max Golembo and Daniel Peck contributed to this report.
(WASHINGTON) — The number of arrests or detentions of migrants at the border this fiscal year remains at a record high, according to data released Monday — as Republicans level sharp criticism at the Biden administration, even as the White House says it is working to humanely manage immigration and stresses its limited influence over those seeking to enter the country.
U.S. Border Patrol’s apprehensions of migrants have exceeded two million so far this fiscal year, including people who turn themselves into authorities between land ports of entry, according to agency data.
With more than a month still left in the fiscal year, the number of apprehensions marks a significant increase from 2021. That fiscal year, authorities apprehended migrants 1.66 million times and encountered migrants nearly two million times — in what was then a new record. So far in fiscal year 2022, there have been more than 2.4 million migrant encounters.
A growing number of the migrants have been exercising their legal right to avoid deportation via humanitarian claims since the COVID-19 pandemic completely shut down standard immigration processing in March 2020.
The amount of time it takes to resolve the humanitarian claims that migrants can make to remain in the U.S. means many end up staying for months or years while their cases are adjudicated.
Authorities overall saw a 2.2% increase month-over-month in unique encounters with migrants in August, according to the new U.S. Customs and Border Patrol data. That growth came despite fewer migrants from Central America and Mexico, and it was driven by people arriving from Cuba, Nicaragua and Venezuela, Biden administration officials said Monday.
The administration has had ongoing negotiations with multiple countries that have their own challenges with receiving migrants, the officials said. (Advocates highlight how many of the migrants face economic hardships and sociopolitical turbulence in their home countries.)
The Department of Homeland Security noted on Monday that “more individuals encountered at the border will be removed or expelled this year than any previous year.”
According to the government’s data, of the 203,598 stops along the southwest border last month, more than two-thirds involved single adults and 48% of the single-adult encounters resulted in rapid expulsion from the country pursuant to a Trump-era public health order under Title 42 of U.S. federal law, which cuts down opportunities for migrants to make legal claims to avoid deportation.
Slightly more than 1.04 million Border Patrol apprehensions resulted in a Title 42 expulsion in fiscal year 2021.
Amid the scrutiny of high immigration numbers, Biden administration officials have said that, in their view, the pent-up demand for humanitarian relief during the peak of the COVID-19 health crisis was compounded by former President Donald Trump’s hardline immigration restrictions, including measures that forced asylum-seekers back into Mexico while their claims were processed in the U.S.
As the government has sought to roll back those restrictions, including the “remain in Mexico” policy, officials have also enhanced enforcement efforts, which is a driving force behind the historically high level of apprehensions.
In May, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas described a six-point plan to address border migration when the department was preparing for the end of the Title 42 order before its rescission was blocked in court.
“What we are doing is surging personnel — both at U.S. Customs and Border Protection, specifically the Border Patrol, as well as enforcement and removal operations within Immigration and Customs Enforcement — to bring expedited removal, that’s immigration enforcement proceedings, to the fullest extent that we can,” Mayorkas told lawmakers.
At the time, the secretary testified to plans that included increasing processing speeds to avoid overcrowding at border stations and a resource surge to bolster migrant transportation for those held in U.S. custody as well as medical services.
Officials said Monday that the administration continues to implement and update these plans.
Meanwhile, Republicans have denounced the White House’s approach to the high level of immigration. Some GOP leaders in border states and elsewhere have also used the migrants as part of public stunts to underline their criticism — buying bus and plane tickets to send the migrants to Democratic states where local officials were caught off guard.
New York City Mayor Eric Adams said this week his city needs help in receiving the migrants that have arrived so far, a request that does not appear to resonate with officials in Texas, including Republican Gov. Greg Abbott, who are managing a level of migrant arrivals many times greater compared to the number they sent north.
“We’ve reached out and stated that, let’s coordinate and work together so we can deal with this crisis together,” Adams told ABC News’ Jonathan Karl on This Week on Sunday. “They refused to do so.”
“They took the call and stated that they would coordinate — I’m talking about Gov. Abbott — they would coordinate, and they did not coordinate at all because I don’t think it was politically expedient for them to coordinate,” Adams added. “It was more to do this, basically, political showmanship that you’re seeing now.”
Abbott’s office, which has said in August that the White House’s immigration policy was “overwhelming Texas communities,” did not respond to questions from ABC News about the level of coordination between officials.
(WASHINGTON) — President Joe Biden turned heads Sunday night when he declared the COVID-19 pandemic is “over” even while stating the United States is still having a “problem” with the virus.
“The pandemic is over,” he said during an interview on CBS’ “60 Minutes.”
Biden continued, “We still have a problem with COVID. We’re still doing a lot of work on it. It’s — but the pandemic is over.”
His comments come a few weeks after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention updated its guidance for unvaccinated people exposed to COVID.
Data from the federal health agency shows that hundreds of COVID-19-related deaths are being recorded every day and that around 14,000 Americans died from the virus last month.
Public health experts told ABC News that that pandemic is not over yet and that Biden’s comments may be a bit premature.
“The pandemic is emphatically not over,” Dr. Peter Chin-Hong, an infectious diseases specialist at the University of California, San Francisco, told ABC News. “I would highlight the first [reason] is number of deaths per year.”
The U.S. has recorded more than 223,000 deaths so far this year, CDC data shows.
“That’s several-fold higher than a typical flu season,” Chin-Hong said, with an average of about 35,000 deaths per year from the 2010-11 flu season to the 2019-20 flu season, according to an ABC News analysis of CDC data.
He said if the annual COVID death toll continues to remain high, “it would be way higher than diabetes, other respiratory illnesses. That number is not insignificant at all.”
As of Sept. 15, the U.S. recorded 655 deaths from COVID-19 and a seven-day rolling average of 391, according to the CDC.
That’s the highest seven-day average reported in the country since Sept. 4.
Additionally, an average of 60,000 Americans are testing positive every day. Although it is not as high as the average of 129,000 being recorded over the summer, it’s also not as low as the 25,000 average recorded over the spring.
“My concern about all of this is that when you say the pandemic is over, that becomes synonymous with there’s no disease,” Dr. Perry Halkitis, dean of Rutgers School of Public Health, told ABC News. “But we know there’s disease that very much exists in the United States still making people sick and still killing people. It could be troubling because of the increase in respiratory illness in the fall season.”
During a press conference last Thursday, the World Health Organization’s director-general, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said the end of the pandemic was “in sight.”
“Last week, the number of weekly reported deaths from Covid-19 was the lowest since March 2020,” Ghebreyesus said. “We have never been in a better position to end the pandemic. We’re not there yet, but the end is in sight.”
The WHO continues to classify COVID-19 as Public Health Emergency of International Concern and the U.S. continues to declare the virus to be a Public Health Emergency, but experts say the country is likely transitioning from being in a pandemic to an endemic phase.
“So endemic means sort of normal amounts of cases … for the foreseeable future, COVID is here to stay and we should expect some COVID cases,” Dr. Dana Mazo, an infectious diseases specialist and clinical associate professor of medicine at NYU Langone Health, told ABC News. “What we’re seeing is that COVID is around and we all have to learn to live with it.”
She added, “And I think it’s more important versus talking about terminology, it’s more important for people to understand that COVID has not gone away. It’s unlikely to go completely away anytime soon.”
This is especially important as the U.S. heads into the fall and colder weather months when cases traditionally begin to rise and new variants appear.
Experts fear people will not follow mitigation measures and states and cities may not be willing to reinstate measures if a surge occurs.
“We’re not in as bad a place as we have been in the past, which is good,” Dr. Julia Raifman, an assistant professor of health law, policy and management at Boston University School of Public Health who researches state-level policy responses to the pandemic, told ABC News. “But I remain very concerned that we are not prepared for surges of new variants. And that we are likely to have a high cumulative toll, almost all of it preventable.”
“Just being ready to turn those on when there’s a surge of a new variant will be very helpful, but there’s no readiness for that right now,” Raifman continued.
Lokman Vural Elibol/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images
(NEW YORK) — An asylum seeker in New York City died by suicide in a city shelter on Sunday, according to Mayor Eric Adams.
“The thousands of asylum seekers we have seen arrive in our city came to this country seeking a better life. Sadly though, yesterday, an asylum seeker in one of our facilities took her own life,” Adams said in a statement released Monday.
The mayor did not name the individual or the shelter and said the city is prohibited by law from sharing additional details at this time. It is unclear how and when the woman arrived in New York City or how long she had been at the shelter.
“Our hearts break for this young woman and any loved ones she may have, and we, as a city mourn her,” Adams said. “This tragedy is a reminder that we have an obligation to do everything in our power to help those in need.”
Adams urged asylum seekers who need mental health support to reach out to the city’s Asylum Seeker Resource Navigation Center by calling 888-NYC-WELL.
“We are here for you,” Adams said.
The asylum seeker’s death comes as Texas Gov. Greg Abbott buses thousands of migrants from the Texas-Mexico border to Democrat-led cities, including NYC, fueling a feud with Adams, who accused Abbott in a previous interview with “Nightline” of using migrants as “political pawns” amid a crisis on the southern border.
Abbott and Adams spoke with “Nightline” co-anchor Byron Pitts in an Aug. 17 interview, where Adams criticized the Republican governor for not coordinating the arrivals of migrants with NYC officials and Abbott doubled down on his policy to bus migrants out of Texas.
Asked about Adams’ accusation that the policy to move migrants to New York City is political showmanship and “un-American,” Abbott accused Adams of “playing politics” and called him a “hypocrite.”
“He’s also being a hypocrite because New York City is a self-declared ‘sanctuary city,'” Abbott said. “And so why he’s ever complaining for one moment about these people being bused into a city goes against his own self-declaration of being a sanctuary city.”
The term “sanctuary city” refers to municipalities like New York City that are willing to defy federal immigration laws in order to protect undocumented immigrants.
Adams said during a June 21 press conference that the city will find shelter for migrants arriving from Texas under the state’s “right to shelter” law.
But as thousands of asylum seekers arrived in New York City over the past couple of months, the shelter system has been strained and city officials acknowledged that the NYC Department of Social Services violated New York City’s right to shelter mandate when it failed to place four families in shelters overnight.
According to Abbott’s office, the state of Texas has bused over 8,000 migrants to Washington, D.C., since April, including two buses of migrants from Texas that arrived at Vice President Kamala Harris’ residence at the United States Naval Observatory in the nation’s capital.
“The busing mission is providing much-needed relief to our overwhelmed border communities,” the Sept. 16 statement said.
Abbott has also bused over 2,500 migrants to New York City since Aug. 5 and more than 600 to Chicago since late August, according to the governor’s office.
ABC News’ Armando Garcia contributed to this report.
If you are struggling with thoughts of suicide or worried about a friend or loved one, call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255 [TALK] for free, confidential emotional support 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
(LOS ANGELES) — Seventeen cats that were in a pet hotel were killed after a fire broke out at a strip mall in a Los Angeles neighborhood on Saturday, according to the Los Angeles Fire Department.
Around 124 firefighters responded to an emergency call of a fire at the 9000 block of West Venice Boulevard located in Palms at 5:44 a.m. local time Saturday, the LAFD said.
The strip mall includes about a dozen businesses, including CatPlaceLA, a boarding facility for felines.
Firefighters were able to contain the fire to seven businesses, including a nail salon, smoke shop, martial arts studio, staffing agency and the pet facility, authorities said. Five of those businesses were gutted due to the heavy flames, fire officials said.
Firefighters removed 19 cats from the smoke-filled pet boarding facility but were only able to save two of them, according to the LAFD.
“While two of the cats were safely resuscitated by firefighters and soon transported to emergency veterinary care, 17 others were sadly beyond medical help and perished at the scene,” LAFD spokesperson Brian Humphrey wrote in a statement.
“Our notion is that the animals all perished as a result of smoke exposure,” Humphrey told ABC News.
According to the LAFD, one firefighter got sick while helping put out the flames, but it was unrelated to the fire. The firefighter was taken to an area hospital in fair condition and is receiving medical care.
Officials said it took more than an hour to put out the flames and that no civilians were hurt in the fire.
“None of the businesses were equipped with fire sprinklers,” Humphrey said.
(NEW YORK) — The entire island of Puerto Rico has been left without power as Hurricane Fiona strengthens and moves northward on Monday.
Fiona made another landfall overnight in the Dominican Republic near Boca de Yuma on the eastern side of the island with sustained winds of 90 mph and even higher gusts.
On Monday morning, the hurricane was moving over the Dominican Republic with damaging winds and rain, causing more flash flooding in the region.
Hurricane warnings remain in place for the Dominican Republic as well as Turks and Caicos on Monday.
The storm has left destruction in its wake in Puerto Rico. More than 1.5 million customers are without electricity after the Category 1 storm, with sustained winds at 85 mph and torrential rain, bore down on the island, Puerto Rico Gov. Pedro Pierluisi said Sunday afternoon.
Emergency response teams for the utility companies will deploy once the conditions allow, Pierluisi said. It will likely take days to restore the power, utility company LUMA Energy said in a statement Sunday.
Fiona strengthened to a hurricane from a tropical storm Sunday morning. The National Hurricane Center said Fiona made landfall in southwestern Puerto Rico on Sunday at 3:20 p.m. ET, dumping torrential rain on much of the island.
Some regions measured up to 25 inches of rain by 8 a.m. Monday, and flash flood warnings remain in effect for much of the island, according to the National Hurricane Center.
A flash flood emergency was issued overnight due to many rivers rising very quickly out of their banks. The Rio Grande de Arecido river rose 13 feet in one hour.
A bridge near Utuado, a town in the central mountainous region of the island, has collapsed, cutting off the communities of Salto Arriba and Guaonico, local newspaper El Vocero de Puerto Rico reported.
The portion of the bridge that collapsed is on Highway 123, a branch of Highway 10, which serves as a link between both roads and is one of the accesses to the University of Puerto Rico at Utuado campus, according to El Vocero.
The bridge, installed by the National Guard following Hurricane Maria, cost about $3 million to construct, the newspaper reported.
The rain saturated areas in the southeastern part of Puerto Rico, along with the mountainous areas, are where potential mudslides and winds could cause the most damage.
Prior to landfall, Pierluisi said Puerto Rico was prepared as it could be, with enough resources and manpower in place to respond — adding that the island learned its lessons from the devastating effects of Hurricane Maria in September 2017.
“We’re much in a much better position than we were five years ago,” he said.
After passing through the Caribbean, the storm system will head northward, passing just east of Turks and Caicos before tracking near Bermuda, forecasts show. The storm system will continue to gradually strengthen in the coming days as it moves north and then northeast this week.
Forecasts place Fiona near Turks and Caicos Monday night into Tuesday morning as a strong Category 2 hurricane with winds near 100 mph.
Tremendous rainfall is forecast, with much of the Dominican Republic expected to receive up to 10 inches and some regions in Turks and Caicos expected to see 8 inches of rain.
On Tuesday morning, Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic will continue to see gradually improving conditions, however, lingering showers and thunderstorms will still be likely, potentially impacting initial cleanup and recovery efforts.
By mid-week, Fiona is forecast to become the first major hurricane of 2022 Atlantic season, with winds of up to 125 mph.
Winds could be as high as 125 mph as the storm passes near Bermuda, bringing strong winds, heavy rain and storm surge. Some models show the storm hitting Bermuda directly on Friday.
While it won’t make landfall in the U.S., the hurricane will affect the entire East Coast with huge waves, rip currents and coastal flooding from Florida to Maine as it moves northward.
President Joe Biden approved an emergency declaration for Puerto Rico on Sunday, which allows federal agencies to coordinate all relief efforts.
Biden’s decision has the “purpose of alleviating the hardship and suffering caused by the emergency on the local population, and to provide appropriate assistance for required emergency measures, authorized under Title V of the Stafford Act, to save lives and to protect property and public health and safety, and to lessen or avert the threat of a catastrophe in all 78 municipalities in the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico,” the White House said in a statement.
Resident Magda Diaz told ABC News outside a San Juan Walmart that she expects to be without power. Diaz said she loses power regularly, especially during smaller storms, and was recently in the dark for three days.
A LUMA Energy official told ABC News on Saturday that the company has been fixing the grid and is ready to get the grid back online if the system fails. LUMA Energy is in charge of the transmission and distribution of electricity on the island.
“We were expecting power outages from Fiona … and we’re bringing in 100 more workers from our parent companies that will be landing Sunday,” LUMA official Don Cortez said.
LUMA Energy’s Crisis Management Manager Abner Gomez told reporters the energy distributor is working to prevent a repeat of Hurricane Maria’s aftermath.
“We are going to make sure [a widespread outage] will not happen because we have the crews,” he said. “There will be damage. There will be outages and we will be ready to respond.”
(BALTIMORE) — Adnan Syed, who was the subject of 2014’s wildly popular podcast “Serial,” is set to appear in a Baltimore courtroom on Monday after prosecutors requested that his 2000 murder conviction be vacated.
He could walk free Monday after new evidence was uncovered by prosecutors.
Syed, who is now 41, has been serving a life sentence for the past 23 years — more than half his life — since his arrest in 1999.
He was just 17 when he was convicted of first-degree murder, robbery, kidnapping and imprisonment of his ex-girlfriend, Hae Min Lee, in 2000.
He has maintained his innocence and denied any involvement in Lee’s death.
A 2019 appeal for a new trial was turned down by the U.S. Supreme Court.
Baltimore Circuit Judge Melissa Phinn has scheduled a hearing for 2 p.m. Monday. She will determine if his conviction will be vacated, and a decision could be announced as soon as Monday.
Syed is expected to be brought to the courtroom from prison.
What happened to Hae Min Lee?
On Jan. 13, 1999, 18-year-old Hae Min Lee vanished after leaving Woodlawn High School in Baltimore, Maryland, where she was a senior.
Her body was found around one month later buried in a park in Baltimore. She had been strangled.
Prosecutors now say there are two additional suspects in the case.
Following a yearlong investigation conducted alongside Syed’s defense team, the state’s attorney for Baltimore City said that new evidence has emerged, including the possible involvement of two alternative suspects.
Prosecutors now say these two suspects were part of the initial inquiry but were not sufficiently ruled out. Prosecutors did not name the suspects.
The motion details how one of the two suspects at one point threatened to kill Lee and both had documented records of violence towards women.
One of the suspects was reportedly convicted of a series of rapes, according to the court papers, while one was convicted of attacking a woman.
Prosecutors are recommending that Syed be released from prison on his own recognizance as the investigation continues.
“After a nearly year-long investigation reviewing the facts of this case, Syed deserves a new trial where he is adequately represented and the latest evidence can be presented,” Baltimore City State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby said in the statement.
“We believe that keeping Mr. Syed detained as we continue to investigate the case with everything that we know now, when we do not have confidence in results of the first trial, would be unjust,” Mosby said.
According to the motion, Maryland law says prosecutors generally have 30 days after a conviction is vacated to decide whether to drop the charges or to retry the case.
Mosby said prosecutors are “not asserting, at this time, that Mr. Syed is innocent” but that the state “lacks confidence in the integrity of the conviction” and that Syed should get a new trial.
Legal experts have suggested re-trying Syed for Lee’s murder will be extremely difficult to prove and is unlikely to happen.
Unreliable cell phone data and witness testimony helped secure Syed’s conviction.
At his original trial, prosecutors relied on testimony from a friend, Jay Wilds, who said he helped Syed dig a hole for Lee’s body.
Prosecutors presented cellphone records and expert witness testimony to place Syed at the site where Lee was buried.
At a post-conviction hearing in 2016, a forensics expert testified that those cellphone records were unreliable and should not have been used to convict Syed.
