Rosselló also said that at least one person was killed in the storm on the island when a board was ripped from a house it had been nailed to and hit a man. He said that the number of deaths could increase in the next few days. Pictured above are downed power lines and poles on Wednesday on the island
By 2 p.m., the weakened storm had moved into open water but the danger was far from over.
The top winds were still clocking in at 115 miles per hour - still a major life-threatening Category 3 storm - and punishing rain was expected to drench Puerto Rico through the rest of the day. The U.S. National Weather Service was predicting up to 18 inches of rain through Friday, with "life-threatening flash floods and mudslides." News footage showed the muddy Guayama River overflowing and rushing in a brown torrent down streets .
"The truth is the danger continues," Gov. Ricardo Rosselló told the island's largest newspaper, El Nuevo Día. "It's going to keep raining hard. Flood zones are at critical levels. We're still going to have a full day of rain."
Comment:
Update: (Sept. 22)
Puerto Rico battled dangerous floods Friday after Hurricane Maria ravaged the island, as rescuers raced against time to reach residents trapped in their homes.The death toll has climbed to 33, including 15 in Dominica, three in Haiti and two in Guadeloupe. Although the southeast coast suffered the worst damage, no part of the island escaped the storm's wrath. Of the 27 river gauges on the island, 13 of them are in flood. The National Weather Service reported rainfall of between five and 7 inches an hour.
Maria has already torn through several Caribbean islands, claiming the highest toll on Dominica, which has a population of around 72,000 and has been largely cut off from the outside world.