Actor Sean Connery says he is “lucky” to still be alive after deciding to ride out Hurricane Dorian inside his mansion in the Bahamas.
The 89-year-old actor revealed that he stayed hunkered down as the Category 5 hurricane battered the islands. As The Sun reported, Connery and wife Michelle stayed inside their home on the island of New Providence, which was spared the worst of the storm as the epicenter hit the Great Abaco and Grand Bahama islands about 90 miles away.
Connery revealed that he and his wife were well-prepared to ride out the deadly hurricane.
“We are both fine. We were lucky compared to many others and the damage here was not great,” the legendary actor told the Scottish Daily Mail . “We had been prepared for the storm, everything was ready in advance – we weren’t taking any chances and knew what to do.”
The report added that Connery and his wife have staff who are experienced with hurricane preparation. They helped to barricade the home ahead of the deadly storm, which was one of the most powerful to strike the Bahamas in recent memory. Connery and his wife stayed safely inside their home while the staff secured windows and moved all outdoor furniture into the home.
Connery purchased his mansion in the Bahamas in the 1990s, picking up a spot in the exclusive gated community of Lyford Cay.
Many other people who were in the Bahamas when Dorian struck were not so lucky. Officials are still trying to assess the damage and come to an accurate total for the death count. As CNN reported, the death toll had been official at 30 people on Thursday, but that number was expected to soar as hundreds of residents remain missing.
“The public needs to prepare for unimaginable information about the death toll and the human suffering,” said Health Minister Dr. Duane Sands.
Dr. Sands added that although the death toll is expected to grow far higher than current estimates, officials are being careful to only make official the number pronouced dead once their bodies have been retrieved and it is determined regarding how each person died.
Sean Connery says he was ‘lucky’ to survive Dorian in Bahamas https://t.co/DkjnHUA1DS pic.twitter.com/HEgpQlQKn5
— New York Post (@nypost) September 6, 2019
The U.S. Coast Guard rescued 201 residents on Thursday, the report noted. International search and rescue teams were patrolling the affected islands in helicopters and in small airplanes.
Most of the destruction from Dorian took place close to 90 miles from Sean Connery’s home, though there was flooding and hurricane damage across the island chain. The Bahamas bore the brunt of the storm, which continued upward along the Eastern Coastline before making landfall as a less powerful storm.