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Hurricane Iota Upgraded to Category 5 as it Nears Landfall in Nicaragua
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November 16, 2020
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1:42Now PlayingHurricane Iota rapidly strengthened Monday into a Category 5 storm that is likely to bring catastrophic damage to the same part of Central America already battered by a powerful Hurricane Eta less than two weeks ago.
Iota has intensified over the western Caribbean on approach to Nicaragua and Honduras.
The U.S. National Hurricane Center said the storm had maximum sustained winds of 160 mph (260 kph).
It was centered about 80 miles (130 kilometers) east-southeast of Puerto Cabezas, also known as Bilwi, Nicaragua and moving westward at 9 mph (15 kph).
Authorities warned that Iota would probably come ashore over areas where Eta's torrential rains saturated the soil, leaving it prone to new landslides and floods, and that the storm surge could reach a shocking 15 to 20 feet (4.5 to 6 meters) above normal tides.
Cairo Jarquin, Nicaragua emergency response project manager for Catholic Relief Services, who visited Bilwi and smaller coastal communities Friday, said he found total destruction in Wawa Bar.
Some people had been working to put roofs back over their families' heads, but now Iota threatened to take what was left.
"What little was left may be swept away," Cairo Jarquin, Nicaragua emergency response project manager for Catholic Relief Services.
Some local residents in Puerto Cabezas waited for Iota in shelters, while others hunkered down in their homes.
Martha Reyes, Resident of Puerto Cabezas, asked for help from the government.
"We don't have anything; we don't have food; we don't have anything," she said.
Evacuations were being conducted from low-lying areas in Nicaragua and Honduras near their shared border through the weekend.
Iota is the record 30th named storm of this year's extraordinarily busy Atlantic hurricane season.
It's also the ninth storm to rapidly intensify this season, a dangerous phenomenon that is happening increasingly more often.
Such activity has focused attention on climate change, which scientists say is causing wetter, stronger and more destructive storms.
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