A young boy in the Bahamas drowned after Hurricane Dorian hit the island of Abaco, the first known death caused by the storm, the Bahamas Press reports.
“The first recorded death of Hurricane Dorian is now being confirmed. Seven year-old, Lachino Mcintosh, drowned after his family's attempts to relocate their home. McIntosh's sister is missing,” the newspaper tweeted on Sunday.
Although the Bahamas Press listed the boy’s age as 7, Eyewitness News reported his age as 8 after interviewing his grandmother.
The Press reported on Sunday that the island of Abaco “is a disaster, no business is operable and bodies are floating around Big Cat. The concern is nobody knows how many people died, and they feel when the water subsides some bodies will be washed out to sea.”
Prime Minister Hubert Minnis tweeted on Sunday: “Today I gave a live national briefing on the extremely dangerous [Hurricane Dorian] from NEMA Headquarters. This is probably the saddest and worst day for me to address the Bahamian people. We are facing a hurricane that we have never seen in The Bahamas. Please pray for us.”
A spokesperson for the International Red Cross told the BBC that the storm caused “extensive damage” to the Bahamas islands.
"As many as 13,000 houses could have been destroyed, there might no longer be any clean water readily available on Abaco because of storm surges flooding wells," the spokesperson added.