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Spared By Irma, St. Croix Gets Smacked By Hurricane Maria

Before Hurricane Maria made a direct hit on St. Croix, the island was serving as the hub for recovery efforts from earlier storms in other U.S. and British Virgin Islands.

A resident of St. Croix for more than three decades, Ditty Layton, survived Maria inside her home on the East End. Layton said, remarkably, she has not lost cell phone service and was reaching out to friends in Florida.

She weathered Maria sheltered in an interior safe room and was able to text throughout the storm with friends and neighbors.

“Everybody I know that I’ve heard from talk about maybe partial roofs gone, some windows, but mostly just the trees and the leaves are all gone again,” Layton said. “So it’ll be a huge clean up.”

Layton said prior to Maria’s threat, she and other “Cruzans,” or St. Croix residents, donated a lot of their hurricane supplies to the victims of Hurricane Irma in St. John, St. Thomas and the British Virgin Islands (BVI).

“I wonder, because we have been working so hard to help St. Thomas and the BVI, giving them all our water, and diapers and…,” Layton said. “I hope we can get the necessities here quickly because I think they'll be needed. I think people are probably going to be needing things fast.”

Layton also survived the aftermath of Hurricane Hugo in 1989 while caring for her three young children.

She said Maria is less stressful because her children are now grown. And she and her husband bought their home on the East End because it survived Hugo.

St. Croix’s south shore and West End reportedly took the brunt of the storm. Layton said Wednesday afternoon she had not yet heard from folks in those areas.

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Downed power lines on St. Croix after Hurricane Maria blew through.
Josiah Harry / Facebook Hurricane Maria St. Croix Check In Group
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Facebook Hurricane Maria St. Croix Check In Group
Downed power lines on St. Croix after Hurricane Maria blew through.

Yachts tossed and sunk in the Christiansted harbor in St. Croix.
Brigitte Rasmussen / Facebook Hurricane Maria St. Croix Check In Group
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Facebook Hurricane Maria St. Croix Check In Group
Yachts tossed and sunk in the Christiansted harbor in St. Croix.

The streets of Frederiksted on the West End of St. Croix post Hurricane Maria.
Kisha Joseph / Facebook Hurricane Maria St. Croix Check In Group
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Facebook Hurricane Maria St. Croix Check In Group
The streets of Frederiksted on the West End of St. Croix post Hurricane Maria.

A partially sunken yacht in St. Croix.
/ Facebook Hurricane Maria St. Croix Check In Group
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Facebook Hurricane Maria St. Croix Check In Group
A partially sunken yacht in St. Croix.

Some of the wind damage on St. Croix.
Josiah Harry / Facebook Hurricane Maria St. Croix Check In Group
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Facebook Hurricane Maria St. Croix Check In Group
Some of the wind damage on St. Croix.

The Quickserve gas station on St. Croix.
Brigitte Rasmussen / Facebook Hurricane Maria St. Croix Check In Group
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Facebook Hurricane Maria St. Croix Check In Group
The Quickserve gas station on St. Croix.

Bobbie O’Brien has been a Reporter/Producer at WUSF since 1991. She reports on general news topics in Florida and the Tampa Bay region.