Bull Bay family saves dogs as house flooded
Published:Monday | July 5, 2021 | 12:07 AMAndre Williams/Staff Reporter
Sunday was the first time in more than two decades that floodwaters forced at least one Nine Miles, Bull Bay, family to find higher ground.
Fearful that even her four dogs would be harmed, Hartence Sharpe screamed until help came.
She was able to make a few calls, and with the assistance of backhoe operators, reinforced the danger area, thus closing off a channel from the Nine Miles main road.
As Tropical Storm Elsa barrelled towards Cuba and Florida, its train of outer bands left an unwelcome reminder to Sharpe of its force.
Sharpe and others went downstairs into waist-high water in time to save the family dogs. Tyres she had pre-emptively placed in her shop to avoid stepping in the water were of no use as they floated in the room. They also managed to push two cars from floodwaters into the safe keeping of the Bull Bay Police Station.
“We had water like this, but not to this magnitude,” Sharpe said, blaming the breach on construction works by a contractor that made her home vulnerable.
“Because they move the wall, everything come over in the yard. Minimal water on the road, but everything come inside the yard.”
Sunday’s emergency works put a pause on the overflow of water.
SIGN OF CAUTION
Sharpe, a third-year nursing student at the Excelsior Community College, said Bull Bay residents, and Jamaicans in general, should mark the near miss by Elsa as a sign of caution.
“God has been warning us. Sometimes Him mek we get a little touch, then Him ease off some, but at one point in time,, it’s going to get worse.”
Kingston Mayor Delroy Williams, who toured sections of Bull Bay on Sunday, gave an optimistic forecast at 2 p.m. that he did not anticipate any major issues.
“The water is slowing now under the bridge at Nine Miles out to the sea, so that is good news. Generally, there is a constant problem at Ocean Lake but yesterday (Saturday) we cleared that area,” the mayor said.
Other areas of concern like Copacabana, in St Andrew East Rural, and New Haven and the Duhaney River in St Andrew Western, appeared not to have raised alarm on Sunday.
Heavy equipment was deployed in New Haven to limit the likelihood of flooding and displacement.
Few people took refuge in shelters, said Williams, citing nine occupants at Friendship Brook All-Age School in Cane River district, Bull Bay.