SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — Tropical Storm Oscar chugged toward the Bahamas on Tuesday after making landfall in Cuba as a Category 1 hurricane, killing at least six people as it unleashed heavy rains on an island also hit by an unrelated massive power outage.
Oscar was located 45 miles (75 kilometers) south-southeast of Long Island in the Bahamas on Tuesday morning. It had winds of 40 mph (65 kph) and was moving north-northeast at 12 mph (19 kph), according to the National Hurricane Center in Miami.
“Oscar is at best barely a tropical storm at this time,” the center said.
It was expected to drop up to 5 inches (13 centimeters) of rain across the southeastern Bahamas, with up to 8 inches (20 centimeters) in isolated areas. A tropical storm warning was in effect for the central and southeastern Bahamas.
The storm made history as the smallest recorded hurricane, with a wind field of only about 6 miles (10 kilometers) across. It caught many by surprise as it made landfall in Grand Inagua Island in the Bahamas on Saturday and a second landfall in eastern Cuba late Sunday.
“It’s not often we see a colossal failure in hurricane forecasting,” Michael Lowry, a hurricane specialist and storm surge expert, wrote in an analysis. He noted no models indicated Oscar would strengthen into a hurricane.
Oscar dropped at least 15 inches (38 centimeters) of rain in parts of eastern Cuba on Monday, with forecasters warning of heavy flooding and possible landslides. The six deaths were reported in Guantánamo.
The storm hit as Cuba struggles to recover from a massive blackout that sparked a handful of small protests and a stern government warning that any unrest will be punished.
Oscar is the 15th named storm and 10th hurricane of the Atlantic hurricane season, which begins June 1 and ends Nov. 30.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration predicted an above-average Atlantic hurricane season this year because of record-warm ocean temperatures. It forecast 17 to 25 named storms before the season ends, with four to seven major hurricanes of Category 3 or higher.
Meanwhile, Tropical Storm Kristy swirled over open waters in the Pacific Ocean.
It was located 375 miles (605 kilometers) west-southwest of Acapulco, Mexico on Tuesday. It had maximum sustained winds of 50 mph (85 kph) and was moving west-northwest at 15 mph (24 kph). Kristy was expected to become a hurricane by Tuesday night.
This satellite image from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration taken at 6:40pm ET on Sunday, Oct. 20, 2024, shows Hurricane Oscar. (NOAA via AP)
Tropical Storm Oscar swirls toward the Bahamas after hitting Cuba as a hurricane
Tropical Storm Oscar swirls toward the Bahamas after hitting Cuba as a hurricane
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — South Korea warned Tuesday it could consider supplying weapons to Ukraine in response to North Korea allegedly dispatching troops to Russia, as both North Korea and Russia denied the movements.
The South Korean statement is apparently meant to pressure Russia not to bring in North Korean troops in its war against Ukraine. South Korean officials worry that Russia may reward North Korea by giving it sophisticated weapons technologies that can boost the North’s nuclear and missile programs that target South Korea.
In an emergency National Security Council meeting, top South Korean officials condemned North Korea’s alleged dispatch of troops as “a grave security threat” to South Korea and the international community. They described North Korea as “a criminal group” that forces its youths to serve as Russian mercenaries for an unjustifiable war, the South Korean presidential office said in a statement.
The officials agreed to take phased countermeasures, linking the level of their responses to progress in Russian-North Korean military cooperation, according to the statement.
Possible steps include diplomatic, economic and military options, and South Korea could consider sending both defensive and offensive weapons to Ukraine, a senior South Korean presidential official told reporters on condition of anonymity in a background briefing.
The official said North Korea could attempt to get high-tech Russian technologies to perfect its nuclear missiles. The official said Russia's possible help for North Korea's efforts to modernize its outdated conventional weapons systems and acquire a space-based surveillance system would pose a serious security threat to South Korea as well.
Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, South Korea has joined U.S.-led sanctions against Moscow and shipped humanitarian and financial support to Kyiv. But it has avoided directly supplying arms to Ukraine in line with its policy of not supplying weapons to countries actively engaged in conflicts.
South Korea’s spy agency said last week it had confirmed that North Korea sent 1,500 special operation forces to Russia this month. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said his government had intelligence that 10,000 North Korea soldiers were being prepared to join invading Russian forces.
North Korea and Russia have been sharply boosting their cooperation in the past two years. In June, they signed a major defense deal requiring both countries to use all available means to provide immediate military assistance if either is attacked. South Korea said at the time it would consider sending arms to Ukraine, a similar statement that it made Tuesday.
South Korea's spy agency said that North Korea had sent more than 13,000 containers of artillery, missiles and other conventional arms to Russia since August 2023 to replenish its dwindling weapons stockpiles.
North Korea and Russia have denied the North Korean troop deployment as well as the purported weapons transfer.
At a U.N. Security Council meeting Monday, Russia’s U.N. Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia dismissed the South Korean assertion as well as Western allegations of Iran supplying Russia with missiles and China providing arms components. He accused the West of “circulating scaremongering with Iranian, Chinese and Korean bogeymen, each one of which is more absurd than the one before.”
At a separate U.N. committee meeting, a North Korean diplomat said his delegation feels no need to comment on the troop dispatch, calling it “groundless, stereotype rumors aimed at smearing the image” of the North and undermining the legitimate cooperation between two sovereign states.
Also Tuesday, the powerful sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un called South Korean and Ukraine governments “lunatics” as she slammed them for making “reckless remarks against nuclear weapons states.”
The U.S. and NATO haven’t confirmed North Korea’s troop deployment, but they warned against the danger of such a development if true.
U.S. deputy ambassador to the U.N. Robert Wood said that if true, the North Korean troop dispatch marks “a dangerous and highly concerning development” and noted that the U.S. was “consulting with our allies and partners on such a dramatic move.”
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Associated Press writer Kim Tong-hyung contributed to this report.
FILE - Russian President Vladimir Putin, right, and North Korea's leader Kim Jong Un smile during their meeting at the Pyongyang Sunan International Airport outside Pyongyang, North Korea, on June 19, 2024. (Gavriil Grigorov, Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via AP, File)
FILE - South Korean mechanized unit personnel parade with their armored vehicles during the media day for the 76th anniversary of Armed Forces Day at Seoul air base in Seongnam, South Korea, on Sept. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon, File)
FILE - Soldiers march in a parade for the 70th anniversary of North Korea's founding day in Pyongyang, North Korea, on Sept. 9, 2018. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan, File)
