Bahamas Issues ‘Urgent Plea’ to Jet Ski Owners to Help With Dorian Rescue

(Bloomberg) -- The Bahamas government is calling on owners of boats and jet skis to help out with post-hurricane rescue operations for residents stranded by flood waters.

The National Emergency Management Agency sent out an “urgent plea” for owners of equipment such as flatbeds, jet skis, small boats, trucks and buses to assemble at a shopping mall on Grand Bahama, an island of about 50,000 people in the northern Bahamas which was battered by Hurricane Dorian.

The storm is starting to inch away, moving at just 1 mile per hour with sustained winds of around 120 miles (190 kilometers) per hour, making it a Category 3 hurricane, the U.S. National Hurricane Center reported at 8 a.m. New York time.

Over the last two days, though, it has inflicted a “historic tragedy” on the Bahamas, according to Prime Minister Hubert Minnis, with five deaths confirmed so far.

To contact the reporter on this story: Matthew Bristow in Bogota at mbristow5@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Matthew Bristow at mbristow5@bloomberg.net, Reg Gale, Pratish Narayanan

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