President Donald Trump has urged any US residents still in Hurricane Irma’s path to “just get out of its way” and not worry about possessions, as he monitored the powerful storm’s advance on Florida from the secluded Camp David presidential retreat.
Mr Trump called it a “storm of enormous destructive power” and asked “everyone in the storm path to heed all instructions, get out of its way.”
“Property is replaceable but lives are not and safety has to come first,” Mr Trump said at a Cabinet meeting at the Maryland retreat, where he was spending the weekend with his wife, First Lady Melania Trump. “Don’t worry about it. Just get out of its way.”
Mr Trump shared a brief video of his remarks on Twitter.
Irma hammered Cuba on Saturday with punishing winds and rain before setting her sights on Florida, where massive evacuations were being carried out.
Mr Trump said the US was grieving for those who were killed by Irma even before she reached the US mainland.
