The hurricane has already claimed its first indirect victim. An 80-year-old man fell from the roof of his house in Bayamon, Puerto Rico, as he was cleaning a drain while preparing for the storm, Puerto Rico Public safety Secretary Elmer Roman said at a briefing Wednesday.
Dorian's center may avoid Puerto Rico and slide just to its east late Wednesday afternoon, Myers said. But it still could dump 4 to 10 inches of rain in a matter of hours in parts of that island and the British and US Virgin Islands.
The storm's projected path has shifted significantly over the past day. Once projected to swing south of Puerto Rico and rumble over the Dominican Republic, it's now forecast that the center will miss Hispaniola altogether, though the Dominican Republic still could get tropical-storm rain and winds.
"It has danced a little bit north," CNN meteorologist Dave Hennen said of the storm's path. "The worst of the wind and the rain, too, is probably going to be in the Virgin Islands."