Residents around George-town and on parts of the East Coast of Demerara were left to battle early morning floodwaters yesterday, after intense and constant rainfall overnight left much of the city and its outskirts flooded.
However, the Civil Defence Commission (CDC), in collaboration with the Mayor and City Council (M&CC), the National Drainage and Irrigation Authority (NDIA) of the Ministry of Agriculture, the Ministry of Public Infrastructure and the Ministry of Communities, responded to the situation.
This was revealed during a walkabout that saw Mayor Ubraj Narine and other officials from the M&CC, along with Captain Salim October, the Senior Response Officer of the CDC, and Minister within the Ministry of Public Infrastructure, Jaipaul Sharma, visiting the areas that were hit the hardest by flooding.
The group visited Albouystown and West, East and South Ruimveldt, where they not only assessed the situation, but also visited a number of residents that were affected by the flooding.
When Stabroek News visited the areas, most residents who reside on ground floors revealed that floodwater began invading their homes as early as 4 am.
According to Christopher Fowler, who has been living on James Street, Albouystown for more than three decades, he awoke sometime around 4 am to use the washroom but found his entire ground floor inundated with more than four inches of water.
The water damaged his carpets and furniture.
Most of the residents’ yards in Albouystown were completely flooded and up to midday, more than three inches of water covered the roadways. Residents in the other areas were also displaced and a majority of them stayed home from work in order to monitor the situation and clean their homes when the water eventually receded.
CDC response
Speaking to Stabroek News, October noted that the CDC has been responding to flooding caused by excessive rainfall over the last 48 hours within Georgetown, as well as on the lower East Coast.
“We have so far deploy-ed two teams to assess the current conditions that exist within Georgetown, as well as the lower East Coast. So far, on this side we have observed that while there are 18 pumps currently deployed by the City Council, it has still not resulted in complete withdrawal of water off of community lands, as well as residential lands, and so if the rain falls within the next 24 hours or so, water can continue to swell in these communities,” Octo-ber said, while assessing the situation in Albouys-town.
As a result, the CDC is now prepared to continue its assessment to understand the extent of the flooding, as they are particularly concerned about the vulnerability of residents living on lower levels, to the floodwaters. Addition-ally, October noted that from their observations, floodwater ranged from two to four inches in some households.
As a direct response, the CDC will be providing cleaning hampers to ensure that residents are able to cleanse their homes as best as they can. They will also be deploying sand bags to build manmade barriers.
“There has been some noted damage to residents’ furniture, electrical and electronic items, as well as small and valuable items that persons would’ve had on the floor at the time,” October said.
He also noted that they have discussed with Narine two places where they can mobilise sand to provide residents with sand bags and will continue doing their assessments in the most vulnerable areas.
With more rainfall expected over the next two days, October said they are encouraging residents to be vigilant and cognizant of the reality and to put the necessary measures in place to ensure that their valuables are not damaged with rising floodwater. He said they should also closely monitor their children to ensure that they do not venture into the water.
Inefficient drainage capacity
Narine also spoke to Stabroek News and said that the current situation is very uncomfortable.
“Nevertheless, all the sluice doors are open and the pumps have been working since two-something this morning. But I guarantee we will have some more rains and we are trying to put things in place. Bear in mind, we have challenges such as the plastic bags, the old chairs, cloth and bottles [in drains] and also most of the alleyways need to be cleaned,” he said, while noting that he is calling on the Engineering Department of the M&CC to be in the fields in order to identify issues for timely fixes.
Chief Engineer Colvern Venture, who was also on the walkabout, told Stabroek News that based on data received, three inches of rainfall was recorded within the last 24 hours, which he said the city’s drainage system was not built to handle.
“The original design of the city did not cater for so many inches of rainfall. We looked at two inches but taking into consideration we have siltation and a lot of the drainage network is clogged, that two inches in which it was designed for was reduced significantly and resulted in a lot of areas being inundated,” Venture said.
Going forward, Venture said that they will be working closely with the other agencies to see how best they can alleviate the situation and prevent a recurrence.
“We ourselves, from the Council’s perspective, will now go to the drawing table and will have to redirect some of the funds that will be required for us to execute our works. Our challenge as it is now, is the funds from the Council is not sufficient enough for us to carry out our mandate but we are trying with what we have, but I think we could do more,” Venture added.
In the long term, he said that they are looking at increasing the pumping capacity at strategic locations and because of the flooding, they will have to accelerate those discussions.
He also emphasised that the indiscriminate dumping of garbage by residents is severely affecting the integrity of the drainage system around the city, which is a large contributing factor to the accumulation of water on the land.
Residents in some of the areas also expressed similar concerns and suggested that the authorities should properly enforce the littering laws and even amend them to apply stricter penalties to persons breaking the law.
Additionally, some of the residents also blamed the squatters along the Front Road for the city’s inability to properly clean and maintain the drains. They noted that the Government has to take a stricter position on their policy against squatters and quickly remove those residents that are hampering the proper cleaning of the main drainage canals, gutters, trenches and alleyways.
