Montserrat on Tuesday, August 16, witnessed the loss of a five-year old boy to drowning in Lookout from the soaking it received from over five inches of rain by Wednesday and higher than normal winds, from a reported strong tropical wave.
This wave rolled by Montserrat with fringes of heavy clouds, loaded with water. As of Wednesday, 8.00 a.m., Forecaster Kimberlain of NWS National Hurricane Center Miami, Florida described the wave which had now moved well west of Montserrat and into the Caribbean sea, described as follows: Cloudiness and showers associated with a tropical wave over the central Caribbean have changed little in organization during past several hours. There are still no signs of a surface circulation and pressures have not fallen over this region. Environmental conditions remain conducive for some gradual development of this wave during the next couple of days. This system has a medium chance, 30 percent, of becoming a tropical cyclone during the next 48 hours as it moves westward at 15 to 20 mph. Elsewhere, tropical cyclone formation is not expected during the next 48 hours.
RMPF Commissioner Foster as a result of the death in a ZJB radio report as he offered condolences to the bereaved parents, called on parents, “to take additional caution in securing their homes and ensuring that proper measures are in place for their children’s safety.”
The Montserrat Reporter (TMR), in its previous August 5, 2011 publication in the “Kids Korner” page, featured floods. It captioned, “It only takes a few minutes for a rising water to become a FLOOD – Are you ready.”
Who is reading we ask? The Commissioner could have directed parents to this simple publication where parents and children would find simple but most important advice and information about flooding and its dangers as one of the natural disasters, to which Montserrat is prone.
For the 2011 hurricane season there have been seven storms, the next to be called Harvey.
(See Kids Korner – August 5, 2011)
