The novelty of violent Caribbean storms has worn off. Clouds and the first bands of rain moved into Belize yesterday morning. Then it was time to take everything that could fly inside, turn on Rene Villanueva's hurricane coverage on LoveFM, and wait...and wait....and wait.
Side note: Rene Villanueva is like the Belizean Walter Cronkite - everybody listens to him and watches him. I'm honestly not even positive if operators answer the phones before he does. People from all over the country call Rene to complain or to praise emergency workers or to praise his coverage or to tell people to come to work, and then Rene tells everyone what to do. "Stay calm and have patience, Mon," or "You really need to get to a shelter, folks." Then he'll take a break and call up the Prime Minister or the leader of the opposition and get the scoop. He is old school.
Anyway, the eye of the storm made landfall last night about midnight as a Category 2 hurricane with winds just under 100mph. The center passed about 20 miles south of Belize City and continued west by Belmopan and into Northern Guatemala. The bad news: it probably could not have traveled on a path with more population. The good news is three-fold: first, no one died as a direct result of this hurricane; second, it passed quickly which means minimal flooding and no threat of landslides, etc.; and third, it just scraped Corozal.
I think just about everyone in the country is feeling lucky today. I know I am. Thanks everyone for your concern!
No comments:
Post a Comment