“I will NEVER live on a Caribbean Island – I’m afraid of hurricanes!”

Or “How I came to change my mind about where I could live!”

Or “A puny cat 5 is not going to keep me from Dominica!”

Or “My daughter Samantha told me so!”

Picture taken 7/21 from the ferry as I saw my island for the first time.  My village is behind those mountains.

I remember saying that I would never live on a Caribbean Island.  Years ago I was in Baltimore when a remnant of a hurricane passed by.  I remember the massive rain and wind and thought then that if that was a remnant I never wanted to be close to the real thing.  So I decided I was never, EVER going to live on a Caribbean island.  Particularly with a globally warmed ocean making hurricanes strengthen faster.

Over the years since I made that pledge I gained a lot of experience and training as a Red Cross local disaster response volunteer. I volunteered for over five years: opening and serving in shelters for mass care, doing disaster assessment after fire, flood, and tornado and the like.  I also had disaster training as a Community Emergency Response Team member.

Even with that training and experience, I’m not sure I would have committed to live in the Eastern Caribbean for two years had I not been with Peace Corps.  I knew that I would be kept as safe as possible as a Peace Corps volunteer because the agency takes really good care of its volunteers.

So I felt prepared to handle a disaster and knew the Peace Corps would have my back.  I also wanted to get some island life experience because my daughter and her husband are planning on moving to the islands at some point and I’m a dad who likes to give advice.

With less than two months on the island I had already been consolidated twice, once for the mega-storm of Irma and once for Jose.  Both passed north with little impact on the island.  My concerns about being hit by a hurricane seemed justified.

Here comes Maria

Since Kathrine and helping provide Red Cross services to those impacted I bookmarked the National Hurricane Center (NHC) nhc.nooa.gov website and on the island I checked it daily.  I started prepping for the eventual call to consolidate on Friday, Sept. 15.  On Sunday, just after 12 noon, we got the word to consolidate Monday.  At that time we thought it would hit us as a category one or two, not a big issue (see my previous post to see how cavalier I was at the time).  Everyone was pretty casual, this being my third consolidation in a couple of weeks and the storm so relatively close and relatively weak.

But thanks to a warmer ocean and other factors the updates on Monday kept showing increased intensity from cat 1 to cat 2 to cat 3 to cat 4.  The electricity was shut off by the power company to at least some parts of the island at 4:35 pm, our lights were out before 5.  I messaged my daughter it was a cat 5 by 8 pm.  My 11 pm message reporting to her that we were just beginning to feel the eye, so about halfway over, was that last one I could report to my daughter that night.  I lost internet shortly after that.

Maria made history as the fastest growing hurricane reported.  It was the first category five in recent memory to hit Dominica with winds of 160 mph.  Maria’s eye ran over the island a little bit before midnight.  By then we had lost internet and except for our satellite phone – all communication with the world for a bit.

So just about my worst case scenario hit within my first two months on the island.

What was I thinking?

What was I thinking as we huddled together in the first-floor dining hearing roofing material banging around outside and car alarms blaring?  What was I thinking as a top floor balcony door and many of the windows in the hotel failed with rainwater pouring down the stairs and into our bedrooms?

Was I thinking that I had been right years ago and should never have come to live on an island?  ABSOLUTELY NOT! 

I was thinking that the La Flamboyant hotel was a strong building and that it was in a safe place.  I was not at all worried about my personal safety.  The structural integrity of the building was secure and so was I.

I was thinking, worrying, about my village, my elementary school students, my people at the top of the mountain.  A category five hurricane can be particularly damaging at the top of the mountain.  The winds come directly and also move up the mountain.  I would not be surprised if the 160 mph winds were more like 200 in my village of Tete Morne.  Note:  Winds made a big mess of the island and my village.  All classrooms in my school night have a good view of the sky without the roof.

Picture of lower part of my village after the storm.  The school and my house not in this frame.

I was thinking that down the mountains and closer to rivers that flooding, rather than wind, would be the major cause of damage to life and property.  Less problems with wind but much bigger problems with rushing water carrying debris like battering rams and bulldozers.  Note: River flooding and debris were big issues.

I was thinking that the people by the coast were dealing with storm surge on both the Atlantic Ocean and on the usually calm Caribbean Sea sides of the island.  Note: The next day it looked like maybe a 10 foot storm surge on the normally calm Caribbean western side where we were.  Many homes and stores close to shoreline were badly damaged.

As the storm made a direct hit and the island is only about 29 miles long and 18 miles wide every part of the island experienced pretty much the full force of Maria’s winds and rain.  The vast majority of trees lost most if not all of their leaves, even if they remained standing.  All banana and plantain crops were destroyed along with just about every other crop in the critical agriculture sector.  Bridges were destroyed, sections of roads were washed away, and landslides blocked other roads.  

All contributed to isolating communities from each other, from rescue services, and from aid.  Most people are still without water, electricity, and communications.  Almost all homes and building were damaged if not destroyed.

Life continues on the island

“We have life.”  I heard that many times walking around Roseau on Tuesday morning after the storm when I did an initial damage assessment.  That was the first thing people said after greetings.  They then might go on to say that they lost their house, but their first words were positive, "we have life", and they showed with hope, strength and determination.

Not everyone, unfortunately, had life.  At this time there are 27 confirmed dead but about that many missing.  Some communities still very isolated and more causalities may be reported in the coming weeks either directly by the storm or due to lack of transportation and services for people who have existing medical conditions.  Still, the vast majority of the roughly 71,000 residents of the island have life.

Evacuated

All Peace Corps volunteers were evacuated to St. Lucia on Thursday, Sept. 21 with the heroic efforts of Peace Corps staff on St. Lucia, particularly the Country Director (CD) and the Director of Management and Operations (DMO), by chartered fishing boat.  We were flown back home on Tuesday, Sept. 26.  As expected Peace Corps takes care of the volunteers.  

Peace Corps will take up to 45 days to decide if we are able to return to serve.  Staff is actively working on this now.  I don't have word of a final decision yet of course, but Peace Corps has a tradition of facing hardship and the volunteers are dedicated to the important mission of world peace and friendship.  And friends help each other!  I trust the agency and the process. 

I didn’t get information from about Tete Morne until my landlady and her family hiked down one mountain and up and over another as well as over debris fields and mud to a place where they could get cell service on Monday, Sept 25.  My village of Tete Morne was heavily damaged.  The roof of my house didn’t make it through the storm.  Some of my things could not be salvaged.  But that is just stuff.  After Maria, not everyone had a home in my village but everyone had life.  No deaths and no serious injuries.  I was so relieved to finally here that news.

Survival mode

At this point almost everyone left on the island is just in survival mode, even those who have already returned to work.  Services are returning to Roseau and some of the other more fortunate communities to have roads open already.  The Friday briefing by Dominica Government indicated that my village might have transportation generally restored soon. Other villages will take longer.  Electricity might take a long time.

Faces of strong people most of the way through a 4 hour hike
down and up and down mountains over debris and through mud
for a trip that is normally 30 minutes by vehicle.

Clean water, food, shelter, fuel are the focus.  Aid is beginning to be properly distributed, but that logistical nightmare is always hard. People are trying to repair homes and salvage contents when possible.  People have reported to work to help clear roads and reestablish services.  (Note: in just the few days I've taken to write this blog the situation continues to improve significantly but most people will be in survival mode for some time.)

The people and the island are amazing and they deserve our help and support.  The tree-covered island has been a carbon sink while the United States and others have contributed to the conditions that enabled Maria to hit Dominica as a category 5 rather than a 1 or a 2.

There are already reports of some trees already sending out new leaves.  Life is returning to the island.  “Tall is her body”, strong is her people.  She is recovering and so are her people.

Good people live on the island.  In all my time walking around Roseau after the storm I never felt threatened once.  I heard hammers and saw people doing roof repairs on Wednesday after the storm.  My landlady worked herself to exhaustion during those first few days to salvage her family’s stuff and mine while completely cut off from the world.  Countless people helping each others have been reported across the island.

Yes, some people have not been showing their best side during the aftermath.  And I know some volunteers in my group did not feel safe at times while waiting to be evacuated.  I saw looting and that has caused further problems in the recovery efforts.  I saw two people carrying an injured person up towards the hospital and people begging a motorcyclist who passed to help, but he refused.  Some people are making it harder for everyone, but that doesn’t mean that the vast majority should not get help because of the few.

I don’t know when I am going to return to Dominica – I’d like to finish my Peace Corps service there – I made that pledge to serve the people of Dominica and to face difficulties with patience, humility and determination.  That is the proud tradition of Peace Corps.  But, I will trust Peace Corps and the process and they are currently working on the assessment.  Maybe I’ll go back, maybe I’ll be sent to a different island.  Maybe my Peace Corps service will abruptly and unfortunately end.  So many unknowns.

Still, the one thing I know is that I will return, at least for a time, to the Nature Island and her people – to let them know we care and are willing to work with them, to live with them, to face difficulties with them.  To help them become more resilient for the next storm that will surely come.

Who knows, after next steps that may take me other places I might just decide to settle down on the beautiful Nature Island of Dominica  -  hurricanes can’t frighten me away anymore.

Taken 9/21 from fishing boat during evacuation.  My village is in the mountains immediately behind me.
I'll post a return picture when I can.

Love always,

John