Joaquin batters the Bahamas

Associated Press

ELEUTHERA, BAHAMAS

Hurricane Joaquin unleahsed heavy flooding as it roared through sparsely populated islands in the eastern Bahamas on Thursday as a Category 4 storm, with forecasters warning it could grow even stronger before carving a path that would take it near the U.S. East Coast.

The storm battered trees and buildings as surging waters reached the windows of some homes on Long Island in the Bahamas and inundated the airport runway at Ragged Island.

There were no immediate reports of casualties, according to Capt. Stephen Russell, the director of the Bahamas National Emergency Management Agency.

Prime Minister Perry Christie said he was amending laws to mandate evacuations because some people were refusing to move into shelters.

“We do not know the impact of 130 miles an hour on those areas,” he said, referring to the hurricane’s winds. “We know it’s a horrific kind of experience.”

Christie and other top-ranking officials also deflected accusations that the government was not prepared and that residents were not properly advised.

The storm was expected to move near or over portions of the central Bahamas overnight.

People on the island of Eleuthera braced for the approaching storm late Thursday as they hauled sandbags and boarded up businesses.

Islands such as San Salvador, Cat Island and Rum Cay were expected to be hit hardest before the storm begins an expected shift toward the north, forecasters said.

Joaquin had maximum sustained winds of 130 mph and hurricane strength winds extending 50 miles from the eye, the U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami said.

The storm was predicted to turn to the north and northwest toward the United States today, but forecasters were trying to determine how it might affect the U.S. East Coast, which was already suffering flooding and heavy rains from separate storms.

“There’s still a distinct possibility that this could make landfall somewhere in the U.S.,” said Dennis Feltgen, a meteorologist and hurricane center spokesman.

The U.S. National Hurricane Center’s long-term forecast showed the storm could near the U.S. East Coast along North Carolina and Virginia on Sunday or Monday.