Death toll from Maria rises to 10 in Puerto Rico: report

Source: The Hill




The death toll in Puerto Rico has risen to ten people after the passing of Hurricane Maria early Wednesday, as millions of the island's residents struggle to rebuild amid a major power outage.

The New York Times reported Friday that eight people drowned in the northern town of Toa Baja, according to the town's mayor. That brings the total dead in Puerto Rico to ten, slightly less than the 15 people reported dead on the Caribbean isle of Dominica.

The island's roughly 3.4 million residents are relying on generators for electricity after Maria's landfall wiped out the entire island's power grid. Puerto Rico officials have estimated that fully restoring power to the island could take "months."

A spokesman for Gov. Ricardo Rossello said that the island was "100 percent without power" on Tuesday. “We have not experienced an event of this magnitude in our modern history,” Rosselló said Tuesday, adding that the Trump administration and the Federal Emergency Management Agency "have responded extraordinarily."

Read more: http://thehill.com/homenews/news/351867-death-toll-from-maria-rises-to-10-in-puerto-rico-report