Sheryl Lee Ralph has one request for her fans: “Pray for us you pray for others.”
The “Abbott Elementary” star asked her social media fans for their support Tuesday as she prepares to ride out Hurricane Beryl, the dangerous and extremely powerful storm that has been battering the Caribbean islands since making landfall Monday in Grenada. The Emmy winner shared her perspective on the calm before the storm in a minute-long video shared to X (formerly Twitter) on Tuesday evening. Anticipating an earlier landfall than forecast, Ralph said, “it’s very calm here in Jamaica.”
“The sky is so beautifully clear, and they said the sea looked like glass today,” she said. “Anyway, I’m looking southeast and we have to take in all of the outside furniture because you know those things take flight.”
The “Moesha” and “Sister Act 2” actor is in Kingston, Jamaica, for her son Etienne Maurice’s marriage to ABC News producer Stephanie Wash. In an Instagram story shared Tuesday, Etienne (whom Ralph shares with ex-husband Eric Maurice) said he was optimistic that Hurricane Beryl would not be “as bad as people are thinking.” He also noted that some invitees opted to cancel their trips to his Saturday wedding.
“#HappilyMauriced is still in full effect,” Etienne said in his story before adding, “I’m leaving it in God’s hands.”
Hurricane Beryl has killed at least six people and was forecast to start losing intensity Tuesday but still be near major hurricane strength when it passes near or over Jamaica on Wednesday, near the Cayman Islands on Thursday and into Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula on Friday, according to the National Hurricane Center. As of midmorning Wednesday, Hurricane Beryl was still headed for Jamaica.
“We are very concerned about a wide variety of life threatening impacts in Jamaica,” including storm surge, high winds and flash flooding, said Jon Porter, chief meteorologist at AccuWeather, calling Beryl “the strongest and most dangerous hurricane threat that Jamaica has faced, probably, in decades.”
In a public address late Monday, Jamaican Prime Minister Andrew Holness urged people on the island to “take the hurricane as a serious threat,” but he also told them it is “not a time to panic.”
Ralph urged folks to “please say inside” before adding that Jamaica would be under a curfew starting at 6 a.m. on Wednesday. She also encouraged people on the island to “stay off the road in Kingston” and ensure that they prepare resources to wait out the storm.
“So to everybody that’s here on island, we remember that Gilbert was a [Category] 3 and Beryl is a 4 — wow. God bless you, good night. Power up,” she ended her video.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
