– residents say operator did not open koker door
Residents of Ithaca woke up to even worse flooding yesterday morning just when they thought their problems were over, following temporary work done to the sluice door which had collapsed on Tuesday.
When this newspaper visited the area yesterday, the water which had receded on Friday night was high again and residents said it was because the operator of a second koker did not open the door to let out the water accumulated from heavy rainfall. Questioned by this newspaper, the koker operator denied that he had not opened the door, but could give no reason for the high water on the land.
Residents said that on Friday night there was just a little water in their yards. They retired to bed thinking that all was well given that regional officials had made efforts to resolve the problem by installing a “temporary stop-off” at the damaged sluice while a new door was being constructed.
To their surprise when they woke up yesterday morning the water had risen higher, though by around 7 am yesterday it had receded just a little.
The residents said they were fed up with the situation and added that government should have sent a pump to assist in draining the water as was the case when Blairmont was flooded a few months ago.
Most of the residents of Ithaca are engaged in cattle, pig, sheep, chicken and cash crop farming for a living. Since the area became inundated around 2 am on Tuesday after the koker door collapsed residents suffered losses to their livestock and crops.
Yesterday some of the streets were covered with water. This newspaper was there when a car attempted to drive through a street and encountered difficulties. Residents had to assist in pushing it out.
One man said he just happened to get up at around 3 am yesterday and noticed that the water had again covered his chicken pen. At that hour he had to move the surviving chickens to a higher spot and throw away the few that had died.
John Benjamin who invested in 165 chickens was distressed that he lost 50 already including 10 that he had to throw away yesterday morning. He plucked some of the chickens to sell, but the others were too small and although he lifted them to a higher pen he was not sure if they would survive.
He had kept his cows and sheep in his yard but yesterday morning he was forced to “loose them and I am not sure what would happen.
“This is the condition we in. The sluice break since Tuesday and up to now they can’t fix it. I don’t know if they have space at the New Amsterdam Hospital for more patients because we must get sick with this…”
Over at Janice Moore’s yard, the water was over two feet high and had covered a high spot where she had moved her cows and four dogs to. She said she found two of her dogs dead yesterday. Another dog was missing and the other survived, by staying “high and dry” on a heap of sand. The woman also said seven of her Creole fowls died. She also had to send her cows out on the street. One of her calves, she said, was sick and was “walking and falling down”.
Further, she said, her daughter was about to take a bath in their flooded outdoor bathroom when she noticed “something swimming in the water.”
Moore said when she checked there were four snakes in the bathroom. She killed them with a shovel.
Yannick David too told this newspaper that there was just a little water in his yard before he retired to bed on Friday night. But yesterday morning he was not prepared for the water that had climbed to the second step on his stairway.
Chicken and pig farmer, Cleveland “Peter” Melville showed this newspaper his pen with his surviving chickens and said he had no other place to relocate them. He said he had already lost over 30 birds and was forced to market most of them “but I did not get the full value.”
He said his pigs were in another pen close to the waterside but because of the depth of the water he could not take this reporter there. He fears that the pigs would not survive the flood.
Patricia Linton made efforts to secure her chickens by raising the pen, using four five-gallon buckets. But around 6 am yesterday her daughter woke her up to inform her that the buckets were floating in the yard. The pen was covered with water and 10 chickens had died. She lifted the four surviving birds onto her veranda and prayed that they would be alright.
Another resident, Samuel Anthony, 67, was packing sand in front of his door to prevent water from entering his lower flat. He said, “in my lifetime I never had flood.”
