Hurricane Joaquin has hit the islands of the Bahamas despite forecasts that it would it would already have turned northward. The category 4 storm did lash the islands with strong 134 mph winds and wind gusts of 160 mph on Thursday. Many islanders said they were caught off guard by Joaquin and were angry that they had not been warned sooner of the hurricane. Joaquin has now taken a northern trajectory, posing a severe flooding threat to eastern states in the USA.