Rescue teams from the U.S. and Canada are experiencing trouble with search and recovery efforts due to debris.

National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) Director Captain Stephan Russell said at the agency’s daily press conference on Monday that a clean-up of the island needs to be done. 

“You would have seen huge 20 containers spread across the whole communities. Again now, they would have gone as far as they can with resource they have – sniffer dogs,” Russell said.

“We now need to start lifting those heavy equipment or containers out of the way, cars out of the way, so we can really get down to the ground level so they can see anybody.”  

The teams with dogs are looking for the missing or dead and have been working on a grid system, making sure they cover as much of Abaco as possible. 

Reports that there are many bodies have circulated, but Commissioner of Police Anthony Ferguson said no bodies have been reported for police to collect, despite it being widely circulated on social media that there are hundreds of bodies. 

“I believe if people see bodies, I believe they will tell us and we will respond, but I have no information of people seeing bodies lying anywhere and we have not responded,” Ferguson said.

“We are far from really covering that area down there is vast.  It’s not something that will happen overnight. 

“As soon as that process is done, then I’ll be in a position to make some comments.” 

In the meantime, NEMA is trying to restore basic services and lifeline, even on a temporary basis. This includes road network, bridges and airports.