More than 870 people are reported to have died in Haiti in the aftermath of Hurricane Matthew, while emergency aid is just beginning to reach some of the more isolated regions devastated by the storm.

Drone footage taken after Matthew passed through shows the sheer scale of destruction.

The hurricane passed parallel to Florida’s coast overnight, where another five people have died. Millions of residencies have also been left without power after the hurricane did considerable damage to the coastline.

While the storm was downgraded from a Category 4 to a Category 2, the south-east coast of the US is still expecting winds of up to 177 km/h as Matthew travels north.

Currently, Georgia, South Carolina and North Carolina are also under states of emergency, and the National Hurricane Center reports almost 12 million people are under some kind of hurricane warning.

It’s not just the intense winds that those residents need to worry about. President Barack Obama warned people in affected areas about the possibility of damaging coastal flooding, and referenced the impact of 2012’s Hurricane Sandy. 

“The big concern at this point is storm surge.

“Many of you will remember Hurricane Sandy, where initially people thought this doesn’t look as bad as we thought, and then suddenly you get a massive storm surge and a lot of people are severely affected.”

It’s expected that Savannah, Georgia, will face the worst of the storm surges. Meteorologist Michael Lowry posted a prediction that the storm surge there could even top the highest tide ever recorded in the region.

Hurricane Matthew is expected to reach Savannah in several hours. We’ll update this story as it develops.

Source: ABC / BBC / The Guardian.
Photo: @itvnews / Twitter.

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