Graz woman on Carriacou

Hurricane survivor: “Saw my roof fly by!”

Alexandra C. is stunned: her adopted home lies in ruins after "Beryl".

(Bild: Krone KREATIV/Alexandra C.)

Alexandra C. huddled in a garage while hurricane "Beryl" razed her adopted home, the small Caribbean island of Carriacou, to the ground with 240 km/h winds. She could still see the roof of her house fly by. "It's a nightmare," says the Graz native in the Krone+ interview.

"Within a few hours, everything you know has fundamentally changed - it's like a nightmare!" With these words, Alexandra C. describes the difficult hours since hurricane "Beryl" hit her adopted home, the island of Carriacou in the Caribbean. With winds of 240 kilometers per hour, it devastated the small piece of land in just 30 minutes on 1 July. At the time, "Beryl" was still a category 4 hurricane, the second-highest category, but was eventually upgraded to category 5. Hardly a single house on Carriacou can withstand the storm.

The shock is still deep-seated
Alexandra C. has lived on the "island of reefs", as Carriacou is also known, for twelve years. The woman from Graz once came as a diving instructor and stayed for love. She and her husband have been staying in a friend's vacation home for a few weeks to look after her animals. "Luckily for us, it's one of the few brick houses on the island - the wooden house we stayed in before was completely destroyed by the hurricane."

During the video call, you can see how emotional the young woman is. "I also find it really difficult to think about everything and describe it," she says. But she does it for us anyway.