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Getting Storm Ready for the 2006 Hurricane Season
by Roddy Heyliger, Op/Ed.
Posted: May 8, 2006 02:18 UTC
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PHILIPSBURG - Preparations are well underway on some Caribbean islands for the 2006 hurricane season.
Governments from the Western to the Southern Caribbean are already in the process of reviewing their storm readiness and have at the same time urged their residents to do the same.
Hurricane forecasters have predicted 17 named storms, of which nine will become hurricanes and five major hurricanes with wind speeds in access of 111 miles per hour or category three and up with five being the highest.
Last years hurricane season broke all records, with 28 named storms surpassing the previous 1993 record of 21 named systems. When reliable data was first registered starting around 1945, the average number of named storm systems was 10. For the last 11 years the average number of storms has been in the area of 15 and this is above the historical average.
In 2005, there was an 18 per cent rise in disasters that killed over 90,000 people according to figures released by the Belgian Center for Research on the Epidemiology of Disaster and the UN International Strategy for Disaster Reduction. There were 360 natural disasters last year compared to 305 in 2004. This increase is mainly due to the rising numbers of floods and droughts that affect large numbers of a nation’s population.
Research data shows that the number of floods increased by 57 per cent in 2005 (107 in 2004 and 168 in 2005) and droughts by about 47 per cent (15 in 2004 and 22 in 2005). St. Maarten had its own experience of flooding in July 2005 that left two persons dead.
Disasters in 2005 cost a total of US$ 159 billion in damage, and out of this figure, US$125 billion were losses caused by Hurricane Katrina in the U.S.
From August to November 2004, nine hurricanes veered through the Caribbean killing approximately 2000 people. Hundreds of thousands were left homeless and economic losses totaled over US$60 billion. Haiti suffered the greatest human toll. Hurricane Ivan, the most powerful storm the Caribbean had seen in 50 years, pounded Grenada killing 39 people and damaging or destroying 90 per cent of the island’s buildings.
Caribbean people based on years of experience with hurricanes and especially the last two years, a culture of constant preparedness and personal safety should have been nurtured.
You only need to be impacted by one hurricane to cause immediate disruption to a nation’s way of life. It is not the number of systems or disasters that strike a nation that one must be concerned about, but their economic and social impact on its national development and the hardships that come associated with it.
Caribbean governments in recent years have come to the realization of other threats facings small island developing states such as global warming and environmental degradation as well as emerging diseases.
Research shows that we are in a period of increased hurricane activity. Small island developing states have been advised, in civil society planning, that disaster mitigation must be given national priority.
One of the latest trends in disaster mitigation is making the latter a component of borrowing arrangements. It makes more sense otherwise you run the risk of having to get other loans to repair damage to projects started under the original loan to build.
Disaster mitigation should be reflected in budgets, national policies and legislation. If current small island developing states are to survive, it is to invest now and wisely.
With the hurricane season just three weeks away, it is everyone’s individual responsibility to get storm ready before a storm system forms. You can’t be too prepared for a hurricane because it only takes one.
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