The Min­is­ter of Rur­al De­vel­op­ment and Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment Kaz­im Ho­sein has met with the May­ors, Chair­men, Chief Ex­ec­u­tive Of­fi­cers, Dis­as­ter Man­age­ment Co­or­di­na­tors and the Trinidad and To­ba­go Me­te­o­ro­log­i­cal Ser­vice (TTMS) in prepa­ra­tion for im­mi­nent ad­verse weath­er ex­pect­ed over the next few days, a state­ment by the Min­istry said.

Rep­re­sen­ta­tives from the TTMS up­dat­ed at­ten­dees that they have been close­ly mon­i­tor­ing two ac­tive Trop­i­cal Waves in the At­lantic which are an­tic­i­pat­ed to pro­duce lo­cal­ly heavy rain­fall over por­tions of the Less­er An­tilles.

The first wave, TW1, has be­come less or­gan­ised over the last 24 hours and no in­ten­si­fi­ca­tion is ex­pect­ed by the TTMS.

The sec­ond wave, TW2, is of con­cern as it is grad­u­al­ly be­com­ing more or­ga­nized and has a more favourable chance of de­vel­op­ing in­to a Trop­i­cal Cy­clone, with a high chance of in­ten­si­fi­ca­tion over the next five days.

The is­suance of an Ad­verse Weath­er Alert is prob­a­ble as there is a high chance of heavy show­ers and thun­der­storms. Gusty winds and street/flash flood­ing can al­so be ex­pect­ed near heavy down­pours.

Dis­as­ter Man­age­ment Co­or­di­na­tors of the four­teen Mu­nic­i­pal Cor­po­ra­tions gave up­dates on their state of readi­ness an­tecedent to the im­mi­nent hy­dro-me­te­o­ro­log­i­cal event. Co­or­di­na­tors are in the process of re­plen­ish­ing re­lief items, co­or­di­nat­ing sand­bag dis­tri­b­u­tions, chain­saws and oth­er tools to aid in haz­ard mit­i­ga­tion.

The Co­or­di­na­tors will be on high alert and the Mu­nic­i­pal Emer­gency Op­er­a­tions Cen­tre will re­main on stand-by to be ac­ti­vat­ed, in the event of se­vere weath­er.

Min­is­ter Kaz­im Ho­sein stat­ed, “We have a very ro­bust dis­as­ter risk re­duc­tion plan in place and you are the key play­ers! Do not look for prob­lems, but on­ly so­lu­tions, be­cause we are all here to serve the peo­ple of this coun­try. I thank the Dis­as­ter Man­age­ment Teams for their quick re­sponse and their con­tin­ued ser­vice dur­ing these times. We must be our broth­er’s keep­er and look out for each oth­er.”

The Min­istry ad­vis­es that its Dis­as­ter Man­age­ment per­son­nel are ready and equipped to mo­bi­lize and co­or­di­nate first re­spon­ders, man­age com­mu­ni­ty shel­ters, co­or­di­nate re­lief ac­tiv­i­ties in the event of flood­ing and oth­er nat­ur­al dis­as­ters, as­sist in as­sess­ment ex­er­cis­es to fa­cil­i­tate grant ap­pli­ca­tions of­fered by oth­er gov­ern­ment agen­cies and most im­por­tant­ly, to as­sist af­fect­ed res­i­dents so they are not cut off from oth­er ar­eas.

Cit­i­zens are re­mind­ed to be pre­pared, stay up­dat­ed and to con­tact their re­spec­tive Dis­as­ter Man­age­ment Unit for sand­bags pri­or to the ad­verse weath­er sys­tem.