Spring tides continued to batter sea defences across the coast yesterday with flooding reported in almost every coastal region as the authorities scrambled to respond with hundreds of persons at risk.
“The current unprecedented high tide has affected several communities in Regions 2,3,4,5, and 6. The Civil Defence Commission (CDC) through its 24 hours National Emergency Monitoring System (NEMS) is monitoring the situation and is in contact with all the Regional Administrations that have activated their Regional Disaster Management System and are conducting assessments and updating the commission,” CDC Director-General, Lieuten-ant Colonel Kester Craig, said in a post on his Facebook page last night, hours after the tides returned with a vengeance to batter communities along the coast.
The above normal high tides are expected to continue until Wednesday.
Craig said that the CDC is coordinating with key agencies and ministries, including the National Drainage and Irrigation Authority (NDIA) and the Ministry of Public Infrastructure (MoPI). Additional teams will be deployed to affected regions to augment their response mechanism and continue the response that commenced on Saturday in Region Three and in Region Five yesterday, he added.
On Saturday, villages in Region Three faced the brunt of the fury of the tides but yesterday villages along the coastline were affected with some facing severe flooding. Photos and videos on social media showed severe flooding at Wakenaam, Parika, in the Mahaicony areas and even up the Demerara River at places such as Craig and Grove where water overtopped the dam and flowed in a constant stream. Photos, which Stabroek News was unable to independently verify, also showed large cracks in the seawall in at least one area.
In Region Five, Craig said that the effects of the tides were exacerbated by a breach of the Dantzig sea defence dam. Over 200 metres of the structure has been compromised, he said. The area had faced a similar breach in July and a number of farmers were affected.
Craig said that yesterday, a five-person team was deployed to the communities of Dantzig, Columbia, Glazier’s Lust, Fairfield, High Dam and Prospect. He said that a rapid assessment in collaboration with the Region Five Regional Democratic Council was conducted across the communities and found that seven families experienced floodwaters in their homes.
“It was noted that several small scale subsistence farms, livestock, including poultry were severely affected. Further, over 10 rice cultivated plots were inundated with salt water on the northern side of the villages while a further five on the southern side have been affected,” Craig indicated.
He highlighted that the CDC provided the seven families with cleaning hampers to ensure that they are able to clean and return their homes to normalcy after the high tides. To further prepare for the two remaining days of above-normal high tides, residents have been provided with sand to create sandbag barriers while the MoPI and the NDIA have provided excavators to broaden channels to
alleviate some of the floodwaters, he said.
‘This ah God act’
Meanwhile, residents of several affected West Demerara villages told Stabroek News yesterday that they did not expect to have the high levels of flooding experienced and called this spring tide an unusual one. They said that after the rush to save appliances, furniture and other items early on Saturday morning, their homes were left in disarray even as they braced for more of the continuing tides.
In Den Amstel, one resident, who asked not to be named, said that there was still water in her kitchen from yesterday morning’s tide and despite the sandbags placed at the doors to her home, water still managed to get inside. She pointed out that she had to move the electric stove and refrigerator out of her kitchen and was unable to cook for the day. When asked if she was prepared for the tide that was expected later in the day, she said, “Ain’t much that I could do, just gotta wait for it to pass.”
The woman further observed that there isn’t proper drainage in the area. “They don’t have no proper drain at the back here…there is no trench to take off the water when it comes down here,” she said. She indicated that residents in the area have called on the relevant authorities to have drains in which the water can flow freely out of the area.
In the area just behind the seawall, an excavator was seen, with workers clearing and creating a drain to aid in the free flow of water expected with the tides. The workers were from Khan’s Construction Company and they told Stabroek News that they were instructed to clear the drain so that water would not settle on the land. However, even with the drain cleared, as the waves slammed the seawall and water flowed over later in the afternoon, persons’ homes became inundated with water. As the excavator continued with its operations, it had to clear a large quantity of garbage and plastic bottles which were dumped by the waves yesterday.
Further along the coast at Edinburgh, one resident, Savitri Singh, who resides close to the seawall, said that she was not affected as much by yesterday’s tide. She said that water only flooded the yard but not her home. Saturday’s tides, she said, saw water coming into the home but she was able to save furniture and appliances. Singh observed that while there are drains in the area, most residents do not clear or clean their drains.
“We nah get no water in the house this morning (Sunday morning) but we still raise up the fridge and so just in case,” Singh said. The woman added that if residents had cleaned their drains, they would not have been affected as much by the tide on Saturday.
In the neighbouring village, Anna Catherina, another resident said that though they would expect high tides at certain times within the year, they did not expect to be affected as badly as they were this year. Bibi Mohammed said that she was barely able to completely clean her home from the water which flooded the house on Saturday. She said that she had to remove carpets and vinyl as they were all left muddy, even after the water had drained out of her home.
The woman had sandbags placed at her doors as she awaited yesterday afternoon’s high tide. “This morning the water deh till ah meh knee, carpet, vinyl all meh had to throw way,” she said.
Mohammed added that she had paid to have the drain in front of her home cleared last week but due to a blockage further up, the water does not flow out of the area but would settle and further rise and stay on the land. She added that while Mother Nature would always take its course, a cleared drain could have helped to alleviate the problem. “This ah God act, nothing can’t stop that, but if the drain didn’t block, the water coulda flow out into the canal and we wouldn’t ah been flood suh bad,” Mohammed said. She noted that officials came into the area on Saturday afternoon and provided persons in the community with cleaning supplies and sandbags to prepare for yesterday’s tide.
