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(CNN)–With Category 4 Hurricane Fiona poised to sideswipe Bermuda later this week, people in the storm’s deadly wake still faced days without basic utilities Wednesday — including much of Puerto Rico, where most were left without power and running water.
Only about 380,000 of Puerto Rico’s 1.5 million utility customers had power by Wednesday morning, the government said. And about half of the island’s customers still were without running water, Federal Emergency Management Agency Administrator Deanne Criswell said.
Water is the top concern for residents like Carlos Vega, whose town of Cayey in the mountains of east-central Puerto Rico faced not only utility outages but also partially collapsed roads — an effect of the major flooding and more than 2 feet of rain that parts of Puerto Rico were hit with.
“(Being without) power … we can face that and we can deal with that. The biggest concern is with our water. Can’t live without water,” Vega told CNN on Tuesday.
Fiona killed at least five people in the Caribbean as it tore through the region last weekend and into this week, including one in Guadeloupe, two in Puerto Rico, and two in the Dominican Republic.
Fiona also whipped parts of the Turks and Caicos islands on Tuesday with sustained winds of almost 125 mph, officials said. Read more: https://www.cnn.com/2022/09/21/weather/hurricane-fiona-puerto-rico-dominican-republic-wednesday/index.html
