Izetta Clay

11/24/12

Prof: Jeff Ambrose

ENG 100

Research Paper

Hurricane Sandy's in KINGSTON, Jamaica

KINGSTON, Jamaica Hurricane Sandy's howling winds and pelting rains lashed precarious shantytowns, stranded travelers and downed power lines Wednesday as it roared across Jamaica on a course that would take it on to Cuba and then possibly threaten Florida and the Bahamas. Sandy's death toll was at least two. An elderly man was killed in Jamaica when he was crushed by a boulder that rolled onto his clapboard house, police reported. Earlier Wednesday, a woman in Haiti was swept away by a rushing river she was trying to cross, in some southern towns of Jamaica, a few crocodiles were caught in rushing flood waters carried them out of their homes in mangrove thickets, showing up districts where electricity was knocked out, local residents reported. One big croc took up temporary residence in a family's front yard in the city of Portmore. Wednesday evening the hurricane's eye had crossed Jamaica and emerged off its northern coast near the town of Port Antonio, meteorologists said, but rain and winds continued to pound the Caribbean island, and hurricane conditions were predicted to last well in the night.

It was the first direct hit by the eye of a hurricane in Jamaica since Hurricane Gilbert 24 years ago, and fearful authorities closed the island's international airports and police ordered 48-hour curfews in major towns to keep people off the streets and deter looting. Cruise ships change their itineraries to avoid the storm, which made landfall five miles (8 kilometers) east of the capital, Kingston. Flash floods and mudslides were a threat for this debt-shackled tropical island of roughly 2.7 million inhabitants, which has a crumbling infrastructure and a number of sprawling shantytowns built on steep embankments and along gullies that sluice run off water to the sea. In the hilly community of Kintyre, in the outskirts of Kingston, Sharon Gayle and a few of her neighbors expected to completely lose the town's bridge over the Hope River, which washed away a section of the span just three weeks ago during a heavy downpour. The shell of a concrete home that collapsed into the river and killed two people several years ago still lies toppled on the sandy banks. They were trying not to show it in front of the children though, “the three mothers said, huddling under a sopping white towel as she stared at the rising river.

The 18th named storm of the Atlantic hurricane season was expected to pass over eastern Cuba early Thursday morning, missing the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay, where pretrial hearings were being held for a suspect in the deadly 2000 attack on the destroyer USS Cole off Yemen. Cuban authorities issued a hurricane watch for several provinces. A hurricane watch was issued for the central and northwestern Bahamas, where the storm was predicted to pass on Thursday, and Friday morning. Forecasters at the U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami said tropical storm conditions were possible along the southeastern Florida coast, the Upper Keys and Florida Bay on Friday morning.

A tropical storm watch was in effect for the area, the center said. In southwestern Haiti, a woman died in the town of Camp Perrin after she was swept away by a river, she was trying to cross, said Marie Alta Jean-Baptiste, head of the country's civil protection office. There were reports of extensive damage to Port Salute in Haiti's far-southwestern coast after a river burst its banks. Mayor Larock Pierre Clervert said a hotel was destroyed by flood waters. Across Jamaica, the poor in slums and moneyed residents in gated communities hunkered down at home as powerful winds shrieked around buildings and sent sheets of rain sideways. Many homes were lit by candlelight and lanterns since tens of thousands of power utility customers were without electricity.

Stranded business travelers and a smattering of locals rode out the Category 1 hurricane in hotels clustered along a strip in Kingston's financial district. Some read prayer books or novels, while others watched movies or communicated with loved ones on computers.

Crist Hopkinson, a Toronto woman who was on a business trip, said she hoped to catch her flight off the island Friday once the stormy weather cleared. “For now, she just hoping that the glass windows don’t shatter from the winds," Hopkinson said in the dining room of the Court Leigh Hotel. About a mile away in the rough neighborhood of Grants Pen, where shops have been ransacked in the past during storms, a number of young men ignored the curfew, riding on bicycles or walking in small groups in the steady rain. Cecile Graham, a mother of two teenagers, said she was worried about the possibility of burglaries or looting at the small markets and shops that line on the main road.

"I hope that all the police are out and we won't have the looting that has taken place before," she said. Police slowly drove through drenched communities in the coastal capital with their cruisers' lights flashing. A senior police superintendent was shot in troubled West Kingston, but the circumstances were murky. The storm was predicted to drop as much as 12 inches (25 centimeters) of rain, especially over central and eastern parts of Jamaica, the country's meteorological service said. Some isolated spots could see as much as 20 inches (50 centimeters), according to U.S. forecasters. Sea water washed over the streets of southern coastal towns like Port Royal, a depressed fishing village at the tip of a spit of land near Kingston's airport.

More than 100 fishermen were stranded in outlying Pedro Cays, a lobster- and conch-rich area about 40 miles (66 kilometers) off Jamaica's southern coast that was the first area of Jamaica to get Sandy's winds and rain. Some of them told local media they lacked fuel to get back to the mainland, but authorities said they willfully disobeyed an evacuation order. On the mainland, over 1,000 people moved to shelters, but others living in low-lying areas on the mainland refused to evacuate their homes because they were fearful that their possessions would be stolen.

The Airports in Kingston and Montego Bay shut down for the day and Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd. announced that it’s Allure of the Seas mageship would not stop at Jamaica's northern Falmouth terminal on Wednesday, remaining at sea instead. Other cruise lines also rerouted ships from port calls to Montego Bay and Ocho Rios.

While Jamaica was ravaged by bands from Hurricane Ivan in 2004 and other powerful hurricanes centered offshore, the eye of a hurricane hasn't carved across the island since Gilbert in 1988, Jamaican meteorologist Jacqueline Spence said.

By Wednesday evening, strengthening Sandy was a Category 1 hurricane with maximum sustained winds of 85 mph 135 kph. It was moving north at about 14 mph 22 kph. Hurricane-force winds extended outward up to 30 miles (45 kilometers) from the center.

Far out in the Atlantic, Tropical Storm Tony posed no threat to land. The storm had maximum sustained winds of about 50 mph 85 kph and it was moving east-northeast at 25 mph (41 kph). Its center was 1,060 miles (1,705 kilometers) west-southwest of the Azores.

KINGSTON, Jamaica Work crews in soaked Jamaica cleared debris and downed power lines left in Hurricane Sandy's wake while trying to restore electricity to more than half of the Caribbean country Thursday. Curfews were lifted and international airports reopened under cloudy skies, which unleashed occasional downpours. People in hard-hit shantytowns struggled to repair battered homes after sheet metal roofs blew off. Authorities said Sandy didn't cause as much damage as they initially feared when it crossed the island Wednesday as a Category 1 hurricane. Still, the full extent of damage was unknown in Jamaica, where some major roads were still impassable. It would likely be days before life in many residential areas returned to normal.

Sandy was blamed for the death of an elderly man in Jamaica who was crushed by a boulder. In Haiti, officials said there were nine deaths, including a man and two women who died while trying to cross storm-swollen rivers in southwestern Haiti. In Jamaica, about 70 percent of the island lost power during the storm and many towns and cities were left without water service. Schools in the capital of Kingston and eastern parishes were closed until next week. The Caribbean Hotel & Tourism Association said resorts in Montego Bay and Negril sustained no major damage. North coast cruise ship terminals reopened to vessels.

In the impoverished Kingston community of Waverley, Eliter Barkley swept up tree branches, leaves and pieces of metal roofing scattered outside the tiny rum bar where she and her relatives spent Wednesday night after Sandy destroyed their shack. Barkley said she and her sister were trying to calm their terrified children when Sandy ripped most of the corrugated metal off their small home's roof shortly after it made landfall with sustained winds of 80 mph 130 kph about five miles east of Kingston. Minutes later, a tree fell on part of the house, sending the entire family screaming into the street.

"The front and the side got mashed up good. We just ran here in the storm all wet," Barkley said outside the Uptown Inn bar, where about a dozen adults and children huddled together until morning. In Haiti's capital of Port-Au-Prince, where many people still live in tents and other temporary shelters since losing their homes in the country's devastating 2010 earthquake, entire streets gave way to rushing waters. Many people carried belongings on their heads and in suitcases. Rose Ducast, a 28-year-old mother of three, said she would stay in her tarp-constructed home despite offers from foreign aid groups for shelter. The structure was leaking Thursday and her belongings were wet, but she said evacuation shelters were "unlivable."

It was wet and uncomfortable for Marie France Augustine, a resident of the Cite Soleil shantytown, where Sandy caused flooding just as Tropical Storm Isaac did when it passed over southern Haiti two months ago. “Everything I own is wet and in the mud," said Augustine, a 32-year-old unemployed mother of a 3-year-old.In Jamaica, all of St. Thomas, Portland and St. Ann parishes in eastern Jamaica lost power during the storm, said Winsome Callum, spokeswoman for the islands' electricity provider, Jamaica Public Service Ltd.

Numerous customers in Kingston, St. Andrew and St. Catherine also lost service. The storm's aftermath may be most difficult for the island's farmers. The agriculture ministry said early reports estimate more than half the island's banana sector was damaged. After an aerial survey of lush Portland parish, Parliament member Daryl Vaz said there was extensive roof damage to hundreds of buildings and the rural area's cultivated fields were devastated. “There is no banana tree standing and all crops have been wiped out," Vaz said, adding that the government should declare the rural eastern parish a disaster area.

In the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy, the Planning Institute of Jamaica (PIOJ) in collaboration with the Office of Disaster Preparedness and Emergency Management (ODPEM) and the National Environmental Planning Agency (NEPA) published preliminary estimates of the damages and losses to the economy, the impact on affected populations, and the financial priorities for rehabilitation and reconstruction. Based on these figures, it is now possible to comprehensively understand the extent of impact. Preliminary estimates of the total cost of impact stands at approximately J$23 billion, or US$326.94. This amounts approximately 10%of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP). The productive sector was the most impacted while the social sector (schools, hospitals) accounted for less than a third of the damage. Nonetheless, some 518 schools and public educational institutions and an estimated 70, 000 houses suffered some form of damage. On that point, it is interesting to note that CaPRI’s field survey revealed that by far the most common property damage reported by citizens was to roofs. 58.7% of those surveyed reported roof damage; only 12.4% reported damage to the rest of the house, and a mere 3.3% reported complete loss of house and contents. This echoes the PIOJ’s own survey data, which found that most of the damage done to schools and police stations was related to roofs. In that regard the construction of more resistant roofs should be given priority in housing construction for a more hurricane resilient society. Infrastructural damage accounted for 15% of the cost of damages, whereas environmental damage accounted for only 0.5% of the total cost.

Set against the fact that only 6 persons died as a result of the hurricane (4 males, 2 females); the impact of Sandy in this regard is consistent with the view that Jamaica has significantly reduced fatalities from impact. Against this background building greater resilience in the economic sectors through hurricane mitigation measures is a priority for economic loss reduction.

The assessment of the Hurricanes economic impact highlights some stark realities, In terms of differential impacts on sectors and sub-sectors of the economy, the bulk of production losses occurred in the agricultural sector, with more than a third of the total cost of Hurricane Sandy to Jamaica resulting from actual or expected losses in agricultural output. In light of the fact that the agricultural sector accounts for a mere 5% of GDP and faces strong competition from low cost imports due to inefficiencies in production yet accounts for an oversized share of national economic.

The key picture which emerges from these findings is that while on the whole, the country is making real progress towards becoming more hurricane-resistant, key weak points exist, and that these in turn have a negative impact on the remainder of the economy. The primary sector as a whole and agriculture in particular, are most vulnerable. So, too, is cement production. Citizens are themselves relatively well prepared, as evidenced by their reports that they were ready to return to work quickly. However, among poorer residents, there is an unacceptably high degree of resignation which appears to be directly linked to their poverty. Finding ways to establish partnerships with the communities in the development of mitigation measures in line with their finances and way of life, including recovery funds, is vital. Equally important is housing quality, particularly that of roofs. The nation’s housing-stock should probably be revamped to make roofs more hurricane resistant - we should ban wire nails. Parish Councils should also be more vigilant in monitoring construction in their area. These alone would go a long way towards helping citizens to become better prepared for hurricanes. These weak points highlight the need for greater involvement of the communities in the design and implementation of their community disaster plans.

When it comes to public and quasi-public sector responses, clear advances have been made in the speed in which utilities are reconnected, and the speed with which roads are cleared. Nonetheless, more progress needs to be made.