Hurricane Maria Discussion Here

[eventgallb]

First and foremost my heart breaks for the people of the caribbean, florida and texas who have lost so much. I feel like a bit of jerk complaining about how my cruise is affected by all of this ... that said.... (and we donated money too!)

 

We are booked on the NCL Jade 10 day for Xmas 2017. This is our "do something different" trip as we lost my Mother this year and did not want to try to sit and have the usual xmas without her this year. Maria is up to a 4 now and is bearing down for a direct hit on Dominica and more beyond. See my itinerary below. Any idea what they will do? 10 days is long to switch to a western caribbean!! Sound like St Crox is now in Maria path too! What is left?

 

Mon Miami, Florida

Tue At Sea

Wed San Juan, Puerto Rico Irma Maria (worse)/

Thu St. Thomas, US Virgin Islands Irma Maria (worse)

Fri Roseau, Dominica Maria now as Cat 4 direct hit

Sat Bridgetown, Barbados Spared

Sun Castries, St. Lucia Maria

Mon Philipsburg, St. Maarten Irma Cat 5 GONE!!!!

Tue At Sea

Wed At Sea

Thu Miami, Florida (Flight Departure)

 

PS - I live in Boston and am awaiting Jose!!! LOL

[JimAOk1945]

What's your sailing date? My own is Dec. 3 on NCL Breakaway. We know we can't go to Tortola, St. Maarten and St. Thomas already. Now worried about San Juan, Antigua and St. Kitts, our other 3 ports. We sail from NYC so a western itinerary is a stretch but maybe our only option.

 

The forecast is for Category 4 over St. Croix and Puerto Rico now. ugh.

To answer your question our sail dates are Dec 8 - 22. We are flying in to Ft Lauderdale on Dec 7th.

 

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N920A using Forums mobile app

[PelicanBill]

And it accelerated to category 4 this afternoon, and now to category 5 as it makes landfall on Dominica. How awful.

[eventgallb]

yep - TWC just took it to cat 5 to hit dominica.... terrible!

[rctfenix]

*Deleted for duplicate data*

Edited September 19, 2017 by rctfenix
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[untailored bostonian]

And it accelerated to category 4 this afternoon, and now to category 5 as it makes landfall on Dominica. How awful.

 

The geek side of this is how fast the pressure is dropping in Maria. In a day and a half the central pressure has dropped 50mb. That may be even more rapid than Irma. Maria is smaller than Irma for now, but I have no doubt that she will become as strong or stronger than Irma.

 

 

Puerto Rico got just a glancing blow from Irma and there is still wide spread power outages and no fresh water. Maria is going to set them back to the stone age. No electricity for 6 months or a year. Massive flood and land slides.

[untailored bostonian]

Also, St Croix may get a direct hit and will be devastated. One less port for the cruise ships. St Johns and St Thomas should also receive additional damage.

[married man]

Cat 5 over Dominica right now.

[kathy49]

can't imagine what a direct hit to that small island will do at Cat. 5...hope it is not as bad as I imagine.

[untailored bostonian]

can't imagine what a direct hit to that small island will do at Cat. 5...hope it is not as bad as I imagine.

 

Think Barbuda.

[PelicanBill]

The Prime Minister of Dominica got a message out last night, saying that his own residence roof was gone and so were the roofs of all he had talked to up to that time. I expect that few structures will be left standing today.

 

We get a break for today as St. Croix braces for impact. Hoping the eye wobbles away and spares St. Thomas and St. John from anything worse than tropical wave rain and wind.

 

Very worried for Puerto Rico. The forecast path is a little north now, which takes it across the NE quarter of the island. That includes the most populated areas of San Juan and towns to its east.

[untailored bostonian]

The Prime Minister of Dominica got a message out last night, saying that his own residence roof was gone and so were the roofs of all he had talked to up to that time. I expect that few structures will be left standing today.

 

We get a break for today as St. Croix braces for impact. Hoping the eye wobbles away and spares St. Thomas and St. John from anything worse than tropical wave rain and wind.

 

Very worried for Puerto Rico. The forecast path is a little north now, which takes it across the NE quarter of the island. That includes the most populated areas of San Juan and towns to its east.

 

I expect Dominica to suffer the same fate as Barbuda. Since Dominica has the very high terrain there will be much more flooding issues. In 2015 Erika which was just a t-wave when it passed over Domnica cause 30 deaths from its floods. If there is any saving grace with Maria, she is a tight small storm. Irma had a wide eye while Maria's is under 10 miles across.

 

I puerto Rico it will be the rains and flooding that will be most dangerous. You should expect widespread, and long durration power outages.

[Cruisenator]

Think Barbuda.

 

Barbuda is relatively flat though and took the brunt of the winds straight across. Dominica at least is a little more mountainous. Still, 160 MPH winds will be destructive.

[Cruisenator]

We have our trip on Adventure of the Seas out of San Juan, PR scheduled for 30-Sept - 7-Oct. Our trip was already altered to go to St. Kitts vs St. Maarten. Have to keep watch for the effects on San Juan for this one.

[OCruisers]

Seems Dominica has been almost completely destroyed.

Now big worries about Puerto Rico and St. Croix. :(

[513AvidCruiser]

We are also on the Sept 30 Adventure of the Seas Cruise. Any idea what could possibly happen if the port/airport in San Juan are destroyed? Would they cancel the entire cruise, or could they take off from elsewhere? What will happen to those who are scheduled to return this Saturday Sept 23rd?

[OCruisers]

We are also on the Sept 30 Adventure of the Seas Cruise. Any idea what could possibly happen if the port/airport in San Juan are destroyed? Would they cancel the entire cruise, or could they take off from elsewhere? What will happen to those who are scheduled to return this Saturday Sept 23rd?

 

Welcome to Cruise Critic!

Good question. Many of us are wondering the same, :confused:

[let's go cruising]

Cruise Critic says that Guadalupe is in a communications blackout. That must mean they have no way to communicate.

 

How are Barbados and St. Lucia? We were at St. Lucia a day after a big storm came through four years ago. Just that destroyed roads.

 

Renee

[RSS from SF]

We are also on the Sept 30 Adventure of the Seas Cruise. . . .

Hi

513AvidCruiser

,

 

Welcome to Cruisecritic.

►

There are

many

of us sailing with you on the

September 30 Adventure of the Seas cruise

on the following roll call thread, where considerations and issues to this cruise (including Hurricane Maria) are addressed specific to our group:

.

►

Please view this thread, post a hello, and express any thoughts and questions there!

---

Adventure of the Seas roll call- 9/30/2017 sail date

---

(

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=2410353

)

.

We look forward to seeing you there!

 

.

- - -

Edited September 19, 2017 by RSS from SF

[let's go cruising]

Barbuda is relatively flat though and took the brunt of the winds straight across. Dominica at least is a little more mountainous. Still, 160 MPH winds will be destructive.

 

Mountains can funnel winds,making them stronger, like buildings in a city.

[untailored bostonian]

Originally posted by 513AvidCruiser

We are also on the Sept 30 Adventure of the Seas Cruise. Any idea what could possibly happen if the port/airport in San Juan are destroyed? Would they cancel the entire cruise, or could they take off from elsewhere? What will happen to those who are scheduled to return this Saturday, Sept 23rd?

Welcome to Cruise Critic!

Good question. Many of us are wondering the same,

This is just my pov and not a forecast. I just looked at the latest projected paths of Maria and they seem to have her sliding over the north-east end of PR and that is the location of San Juan. That will happen over the night. It might even slide just off the coast and not make landfall in PR.

 

Maria is a relatively small storm and the hurricane winds are not very far out from the center. The extreme cat-5 winds are within miles of the eyewall. On the current course, Maria's strongest winds might stay offshore.

 

The airport will not be destroyed but will have some issues. By the 23rd it could be open. I doubt the port will be put out of commission. What will be more of a problem will be the lack of electrical service and the conditions of the hotels.

 

This is the year of canceled, delayed, and shortened cruises. If RCCL is going to alter your cruise you will find out on Thursday.

[cltnccruisers]

I thought I was seeing the same thing, UB, that she seemed to be sliding to a slightly more northerly track. Hoping that maybe San Juan would be southish of the eye when Maria passes. Could just be wishful thinking, though.

[untailored bostonian]

I thought I was seeing the same thing, UB, that she seemed to be sliding to a slightly more northerly track. Hoping that maybe San Juan would be southish of the eye when Maria passes. Could just be wishful thinking, though.

 

 

I go to a site that shows the HMON, HWRF, and GFS with a closer, granular, animation showing only about 300 diameter focus. These are not the offical NHC forcast paths. Their most recent runs are just to the east of the forecast path by about 20-25 miles. Does not sound like much but that takes the center to the north coast of PR. Maria's eye is 10 miles wide at most. If just the south eye wall skims the coast, San Juan will the worst.

 

 

Right now Maria is 40 miles SE of Sint Eustatius and they only have winds to 60mph. Good news/bad news. This will place Maria dead center on St Croix. Scratch another potential port. The real danger to PR is the rain on the south side of the island. Also, their electrical grid was not even fully patched from Irma. This will be worse.

[Earthworm Jim]

What's your sailing date? My own is Dec. 3 on NCL Breakaway. We know we can't go to Tortola, St. Maarten and St. Thomas already. Now worried about San Juan, Antigua and St. Kitts, our other 3 ports. We sail from NYC so a western itinerary is a stretch but maybe our only option.

 

I wouldn't jump to any conclusions yet about what will and will not be open in a month an a half, unless you've seen some information I haven't seen. Yes, many of these islands were hit very hard, and certainly won't be totally recovered by then. But I wouldn't rule out that they could have the roads cleared, the electricity restored, and have enough businesses reopened that it's possible some of these places will be operational again.

 

In any event, I doubt a western itinerary is possible. More likely they'd go to the Bahamas and maybe Port Canaveral if they can't make any of their normal ports.

[PelicanBill]

I think we just have to wait and see what happens the next 2 days in San Juan. If the storm could just nose a little further north again and pass the right side of San Juan it would be way better. The present path across the NE quarter is not good. If the airport takes a really bad blow they will have it operational in days but for emergency use primarily. I can easily see it being operational for passengers by Sep. 30 and I can see it being a problem. Just too close to predict. I predict the port will be OK as long as the building is usable and they have power by then.

 

As for the ports already hit - it has been well agreed from many sources that St. Maarten and Tortola will not receive cruise ships for many months. St. Thomas has fared better but readiness for December is 50/50 at best. If they do open it will be with few shops open and few excursions available. The roads are impassable and power will take months to restore. I flew to St. Thomas in 1996, a year after Marilyn - and it was still in recovery mode.