Hurricane Oscar made landfall on the northern coast of eastern Cuba on Sunday evening, the National Hurricane Center said.
The hurricane made landfall in the Cuban province of Guantanamo near the town of Baracoa around 5:50 p.m., the hurricane center said.
At the time of landfall, Oscar had maximum sustained winds of 80 mph.
Oscar, which the National Hurricane Center classified as “compact but powerful,” formed off the coast of the Bahamas on Saturday, prompting a hurricane warning for the northern coast of Cuba’s Holguin and Guantanamo provinces, as far as the island’s eastern tip. , Punta de Maisi.
The Hurricane Center reported that the Category 1 storm was moving west-southwest at 7 mph.
Oscar is expected to move across eastern Cuba on Sunday night into Monday and move northeast across the central Bahamas on Tuesday.
“After landfall, Oscar is expected to weaken, but may still become a tropical storm as it moves north of Cuba late Monday and across the central Bahamas on Tuesday,” the center said earlier Sunday.
Cuba, which has experienced two power outages in 24 hours, is bracing for the impact with storm warnings and watches. In addition to hurricane warnings, the northern coast of the Cuban province of Las Dunas was under both a hurricane watch and a tropical storm warning.
A tropical storm warning was in effect for the southeastern Bahamas and the southern coast of Guantanamo, and a tropical storm watch was in effect for the northern coast of Camagüey province.
The hurricane center said eastern Cuba will be hit with hurricanes and heavy rain Sunday night.
The center said rainfall could reach 5 to 10 inches in eastern Cuba, with up to 15 inches in some places. The southeastern Bahamas could see 3 to 8 inches of rain, and the Turks and Caicos could see 2 to 4 inches by Wednesday morning.
A storm surge of about 1 to 3 feet is expected along Cuba’s northern coast, with “large and destructive waves” near the coast.
