GUAM — Sixteen babies were delivered at Guam Memorial Hospital after the island moved to Condition of Readiness 1 on Saturday, and the hospital reported no power loss while Super Typhoon Champi passed south of Guam on Sunday morning, Guam Homeland Security said.
None of the 13 expectant mothers the hospital sheltered delivered during that period. Late-term mothers had been told to report in before the storm, as TEH covered in its Typhoon Champi Guam report on the hospital plan, and three patients were treated in the emergency department and discharged.
Champi made its closest approach at about 4:26 a.m., Guam time, roughly 10 miles south of Merizo, and southern Guam took the worst of the wind and rain, the agency’s Joint Information Center said. The Guam Power Authority put the share of the island with electricity at about 75 percent at 5:30 a.m. and about 50 percent at 7:50 a.m., as feeders in central and northern Guam tripped offline.
Donald Trump approved Gov. Lou Leon Guerrero’s request for a presidential emergency declaration, which authorizes the Federal Emergency Management Agency to coordinate emergency assistance, the Joint Information Center said on Sunday morning.
Six emergency evacuation centers held 892 people, by TEH’s addition of the occupancy table issued Saturday night, with Astumbo Elementary School at 279 of its 287 spaces. The same counts were repeated in releases at 8:50 p.m., 9:51 p.m. and 4:56 a.m., so TEH has no later figure.
The Guam Waterworks Authority reported 98 production wells online at 8 a.m., 72 of them on standby generators, with low or no water pressure in parts of Pago Bay, Malesso’ and Latte Heights. It received no reports of sewer overflows.
At 12:45 p.m., the center said that public and Catholic schools would stay closed Monday and that power crews would start damage assessments and restoration once winds drop to safe levels. A 9 a.m. count measured something different: 51 percent of distribution feeders online, with no island-wide blackout.
Champi follows two earlier storms. NASA’s Earth Observatory said in July that Super Typhoon Bavi caused extensive damage across Guam, Rota and Saipan, according to news reports, on top of Super Typhoon Sinlaku, which crossed the islands in mid-April.
The same 12:45 p.m. update still told residents to stay in “a sturdy, concrete-reinforced structure until COR 4 is announced,” and set an initial windshield assessment of roads, utilities and debris for that afternoon. What the teams found was not public when TEH last checked.
