Miami is already under a curfew that will last 12 hours, while other cities and several counties in southern Florida have taken similar steps in the face of the imminent arrival of the powerful hurricane Irma to the state after its passage through Cuba.
Miami will have this restriction for 12 hours from 19.00 local time (2300 GMT) today, while Miami-Dade County has decided not to take such action for the time being.
Miami Beach did order the same restriction, but for an hour later than Miami.
Broward County, north of Miami and where Fort Lauderdale is, has an indefinite curfew from 4:00 pm local time today (20:00 GMT).
“When the winds reach 45 miles per hour (72 kilometers), officers will not respond,” warned Barbara Sharief, Mayor of Broward County, in announcing the move.
Similarly, the city of Coral Springs, in Broward, established the measure for 10 hours from 20.00 local time today (10.00 GMT Sunday).
Local authorities in South Florida said they will be vigilant to enact more preventive measures in the face of Irma’s imminence.
The powerful hurricane first threatens Florida Keys, where authorities have warned that there will be no safe place, so those who remain there despite the evacuation order will be at their own risk until emergency services can go , which will not be immediately.
Miami is most likely to escape the hurricane eye due to a turning that now threatens the southwest coast of Florida, prompting state authorities to issue new evacuation orders.
The first rains associated with Hurricane Irma arrived in Miami today, and with them, the first lightning strikes, despite the fact that the hurricane’s strong winds, at 133 miles per hour, with stronger gusts, hardly feel yet in the city.
Irma’s external bands were already felt today in the Keys, where the hurricane is expected this Sunday morning, and in the south of the Florida peninsula, where it can touch land that same day in the afternoon or evening.
The hurricane was downgraded to Category 3 after landfall on Friday night on the north coast of Cuba, but will be strengthened again on its way to Florida, according to the US National Hurricane Center (CNH).
As of noon Saturday, about 6.3 million Floridians had been ordered to evacuate their places of residence, a figure that is equivalent to 30 percent of the state’s population, and more than 54,000 are in the 385 shelters set up so far.
