Caribbean Com­mu­ni­ty (CARI­COM) lead­ers Sun­day have post­poned their an­nu­al sum­mit that was due to be­gin in Grena­da this week “to a date to be de­ter­mined” as sev­er­al Caribbean coun­tries brace for the pas­sage of a very dan­ger­ous Hur­ri­cane Beryl.

Grena­da was due to host the Ju­ly 3-5 sum­mit, but the Caribbean Me­dia Cor­po­ra­tion (CMC) has been re­li­ably in­formed that fol­low­ing con­sul­ta­tions with the Grena­da Prime Min­is­ter Dick­on Mitchell, and the CARI­COM Bu­reau, “it is agreed that the Meet­ings in Grena­da lat­er this week will be post­poned to a date to be de­ter­mine.”

“This took in­to con­sid­er­a­tion that Hur­ri­cane Beryl strength­ened overnight to a Cat­e­go­ry 3 and will pass south of Bar­ba­dos and then St. Vin­cent and the Grenadines overnight.  From there its pro­ject­ed path takes it near Haiti, Ja­maica and then Be­lize by the end of the week,” the sources told CMC.

They said that air­line trav­el is al­ready be­ing im­pact­ed with sched­ule changes al­ready hap­pen­ing and more is ex­pect­ed.

“Most mem­ber states, in­clud­ing host coun­try Grena­da, will be deal­ing with emer­gency prepa­ra­tions and the af­ter­ef­fects. The pri­ma­ry fo­cus across the Com­mu­ni­ty is prepar­ing for the im­pact and pro­tect­ing the safe­ty and se­cu­ri­ty of the peo­ple,” the sources said, adding that re­gion­al coun­tries are ex­pect­ed to be in­formed of the de­ci­sion “very short­ly”.

Mean­while, the Mi­a­mi-based Na­tion­al Hur­ri­cane Cen­ter (NHC) in its lat­est bul­letin said that the hur­ri­cane is about 420 miles east south-east of Bar­ba­dos with max­i­mum sus­tained winds of 115 miles per hour (mph).

It is mov­ing for­ward at 21 mph and that hur­ri­cane warn­ings are in ef­fect for To­ba­go, Bar­ba­dos, St. Lu­cia, St. Vin­cent and the Grena­dine Is­lands and Grena­da.

A trop­i­cal storm warn­ing is in ef­fect for Mar­tinique and a trop­i­cal storm watch is in ef­fect for Do­mini­ca.

The eye of Hur­ri­cane Beryl was lo­cat­ed near lat­i­tude 10.6 North, lon­gi­tude 53.9 West.

“Beryl is mov­ing to­ward the west near 21 mph.  A con­tin­ued quick west­ward to west-north-west­ward mo­tion is ex­pect­ed dur­ing the next few days.

“On the fore­cast track, the cen­tre of Beryl is ex­pect­ed to move across the Wind­ward Is­lands ear­ly on Mon­day and across the south­east­ern Caribbean Sea Mon­day night and Tues­day.

The NHC said that con­tin­ued rapid strength­en­ing is fore­cast over the next day or so, and Beryl is ex­pect­ed to be­come an ex­treme­ly dan­ger­ous cat­e­go­ry 4 hur­ri­cane be­fore it reach­es the Wind­ward Is­lands. —BRIDGETOWN, Bar­ba­dos (CMC)