美国有线新闻 CNN 飓风玛丽亚来袭 直扑波多黎各

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Tuesday night, the Leeward¹ Islands in the eastern Caribbean took another hit from an Atlantic Hurricane. This one is named Maria and it's powerful.

And the 24 hours before it started lashing² the islands of Martinique and Dominica, this hurricane had doubled in strength.

Forecasters expected Maria to be a category four storm with wind speeds of at least 135 miles per hour when it made its first landfall. But there was some uncertainty³ about that because Maria was expected to keep growing.

Several Caribbean islands were devastated⁴ by hurricane Irma, less than two weeks ago. Communication lines are still down in the British Virgin⁵ Islands and they could now get hit by Maria.

As of last night, the storm was spinning northwest toward the U.S. Commonwealth⁶ of Puerto Rico. The governor there declared a state of emergency to free up government funds to help with disaster recovery. If Maria makes landfall there, that's? likely to happen on Wednesday.

And if it does so as a category four hurricane, it would be the first one that strong to hit Puerto Rico in 85 years.

The National Hurricane Center predicted rainfall of six to 12 inches on the island, with some areas possibly getting more than two feet of rain. That could lead to flooding and mudslides.