It’s been a week since Hurricane Maria made landfall in eastern Puerto Rico, and hundreds of thousands of Puerto Ricans living in remote villages remain cut off from the world, after the storm trashed power grids, tore up roads, downed cell towers and caused a dam in the northwestern part of the island to fail, endangering tens of thousands of people living in a valley below.
A week after then-category 4 Hurricane Maria made landfall in densely populated eastern Puerto Rico, electricity remains offline across most of the island, while supplies of staples like gas, food and water are dwindling. Shelters on the island are reportedly running low on food, and the government managers of the emergency response effort are scrambling to evacuate 70,000 people from a river valley that’s in danger of being completely submerged after a nearby dam failed.
Days after Hurricane Maria passed over the island and made its way west toward the Dominican Republican, Puerto Rico is still struggling with the initial response to the storm – rescuing people stranded in remote villages, and moving thousands into government shelters. Meanwhile the island's first responders are making due without electricity, gas or cell phone service after the storm dealt a knockout blow to its infrastructure.
With electricity and cell phone service still offline across most of hurricane-damaged island, NBC reports that a dam in northwest Puerto Rico has failed, causing even more flash flooding and prompting emergency evacuations.
Guajataca Dam operators said it failed at 2:10 pm ET, prompting the NWS to issue a flash flood emergency warning for Isabela and Quebradillas municipalities.
"This is an EXTREMELY DANGEROUS SITUATION. Busses are currently evacuating people from the area as quickly as they can," NWS San Juan said.
Even after weakening to a category 4 storm shortly before making landfall along the southeastern coast of Puerto Rico, Hurricane Maria caused unprecedented devastation to the cash-strapped island and knocking out electricity for all of its 3.4 million residents. Worse still, the island’s governor has said it could be months before power is restored to all customers, according to the Associated Press.