Nearly 170 Canadians are stranded in Hurricane Maria-ravaged regions and seeking help from the federal government.
The majority of those 168 people are on the Caribbean island of Dominica, which was devastated by the storm, said Omar Alghabra, parliamentary secretary to minister of foreign affairs.
Global Affairs Canada, which had been urging people to flee Maria’s path before the hurricane made landfall, said Thursday that 5,100 Canadians had been registered in the storm’s path.
Alghabra said that 147 Canadian students of Ross University in Dominica are accounted for on the island.
“They’re safe, they’re in shelter, they have food and water and we are in touch with their families,” he told reporters.
Ross University has confirmed the safety of more than 1,000 of its students on the island and said it will help them leave Dominica by boat. The students will be taken to the island of St. Lucia, where Canadian consular staff will meet them, Alghabra said.
Nadia Araujo said her sister is among the Canadians stuck in Dominica.
Denise Araujo is a medical student at All Saints University School in Dominica’s capital, Roseau, which experienced heavy flooding and serious damage.
Nadia Araujo said she heard from her sister on Wednesday via text message, which described unsafe conditions in the capital, with no electricity or running water.
“There has been very little aid being sent to Roseau…so she wasn’t getting much help,” Araujo told CTV News Channel Thursday.
She said her sister has been told to stay indoors at night as some people have been seen walking around the city with machetes, looking for food.
“She’s not in the safest conditions. She’s not getting any help right now,” Araujo said.
She said her family has contacted the school and the Canadian government and is hoping that someone will help Denise and her schoolmates leave the region.
All Saints University has posted a message on its website saying that the school is “making efforts to send supplies…and also to evacuate students and faculty members to our campus in St. Vincent and the Grenadines until normalcy returns.”
Other Canadian families, however, are still desperate for word from their loved ones.
Lucy Marlin, for example, is still waiting to hear from her 67-year-old father, Patrick J. Mullin of Kemble, Ont., who was on the island of Dominica, where he works for World University Service of Canada, when the hurricane struck.
“His plan had been to stay home during the hurricane, as instructed,” Marlin told CTV News. “We have heard nothing about him.”
Marlin said that she has only received conflicting and unclear information from Global Affairs.
“We fear that now that three days has passed, he may not be able to withstand the conditions there,” she said. “We fear for him and the longer the Canadian Government waits, the more danger he may be in, if he is okay. He must be found.”
Dominica Tourism Minister Robert Tonge said Thursday that one of two airports serving the country is inoperable while the other is expected to be operational in the coming days. An estimated 95 per cent of the roofs were blown off in some towns on the island, he said.
Global Affairs said that Canadian airlines have flown 6,000 people out of Maria-affected regions so far.
Like with Hurricane Irma, Ottawa will rely on commercial airlines to pick up Canadians stranded in the Caribbean once flights are able to land in the area, CTV’s Michel Boyer reported Thursday.
After hitting Dominica, Hurricane Maria made landfall in Puerto Rico, where electricity has been knocked out across the entire island. It was the strongest hurricane to hit Puerto Rico in over 80 years.
With files from The Associated Press
