IOTA BREAKS MORE HURRICANE SEASON RECORDS

An already record-breaking 2020 Atlantic Hurricane season has gone further into the history books with Hurricane Iota.

The storm which breezed by well to the south of the Cayman Islands on its way to becoming a destructive Category 5 caused rough seas around the islands.

But it was again Central America that has taken a beating just days after being hammered by Hurricane Eta another storm for the 2020 record books.

Relatives on the Cayman Islands were particularly concerned about the welfare of their loved ones in Nicaragua where Iota made landfall, as well as Honduras and Guatemala.

Those countries still reeling from the damage caused by Hurricane Eta were again pounded by another ferocious hurricane as Iota cut a swathe of destruction across the three Central American neighbours.

The storm slammed into Nicaragua at Category 4 strength in an area near where the equally devastating Hurricane Eta struck just two weeks ago leaving around 200 people dead and many others.

It was feared that the damage on Nicaragua alone could be catastrophic.

In Guatemala there are reports of around 100 people being buried after a mudslide triggered by Hurricane Iota slammed into a village.

It was the second time in as many weeks that the village called Queja has been so seriously impacted by a hurricane as the ground is already heavily saturated.

It suffered a similar fate with Hurricane Eta.

Many areas across Honduras, Nicaragua and Guatemala in particular experienced torrential rainfall resulting in severe flooding.

Massive downpours from the storm also spread across a large area from Belize to Panama.

Iota has booked its place in the record books of the unusual 2020 record-breaking hurricane season by becoming the 13th hurricane this year.

It was the second major hurricane to hit Nicaragua into two weeks, where the already catastrophic damage from Hurricane Eta a fortnight earlier has only compounded an already horrific situation.

Weather experts say that Iota is the strongest storm ever to hit Nicaragua.

As Iota dissipates, the good news was that its remnants were headed across Central America into the Pacific, unlike Hurricane Eta which did a U-turn and headed back into the Caribbean Sea to cause further destruction and disruption including on Cayman.

The 2020 hurricane season which will long be remembered, ends on November 30th.