Sinlaku rips through Northern Mariana Islands as strongest tropical cyclone this year

Super Typhoon Sinlaku hammered the Northern Mariana Islands, flipping over cars, toppling utility poles and ripping away tin roofs.Authorities were just beginning to assess the damage left behind by the typhoon, which first hit the islands on Tuesday night local time and continued with a barrage of fierce winds and relentless rains for hours on Wednesday. So far, there have been no reports of deaths.Power was out and many of the roads were impassible across Saipan, a US territory that’s the largest of the Mariana Islands and home to about 43,000 people, according to local officials.The storm also battered Guam, another US territory and the site of several US military bases, with tropical force winds.The typhoon – the strongest tropical cyclone on Earth this year – was packing sustained winds of up to 150mph (240km/h) when it made landfall on the islands, the National Weather Service said.The monster storm still had winds of 125mph (200km/h) late on Wednesday night as it pulled away to the north from the islands of Saipan, Tinian and Rota, the weather service said. Sinlaku is expected to start curving toward sparsely populated volcanic islands in the far northern Marianas.It was still very windy and rainy roughly 24 hours after the typhoon rattled the islands, but much better than the previous night, said Jaden Sanchez, spokesperson for the Saipan mayor’s office.Preliminary reports include a lot of flooding, uprooted trees and downed power lines, but no deaths, he said.Images from Saipan showed residential lots littered with debris and mangled trees. Winds crumbled metal bleachers at a sports field.Dong Min Lee, a resident, shot video of a car sitting on top of two others in his apartment building’s parking lot. The winds tore off part of his balcony railing.The American Red Cross and its partners were sheltering more than 1,000 residents across Guam and the Northern Marianas, agency spokesperson Stephanie Fox said.