RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

Overnight driz­zle through­out South Trinidad has trig­gered flood­ing in sev­er­al parts of Pe­nal, Debe and Bar­rack­pore.

At Welling­ton Road Debe and M2 Ring Road, floods have sub­sided along with the rains, but res­i­dents said the ris­ing tide posed prob­lems for peo­ple in the low­est ar­eas of the South Oropouche Drainage Basin.

In Wood­land, res­i­dents had al­ready stacked sand­bags around their homes and put valu­ables on high­er ground.

Di­ane Ali-Bo­cas placed a mat­tress in­side a road­side par­lour high­er up to the front of her house. While the floods rose, she and her fam­i­ly stayed in the par­lour. In­side their home was al­ready flood­ed.

“This is nor­mal for us. Every time we have to deal with this. It is un­bear­able," she said.

At Pe­nal Rock Road, planned protests were aban­doned as the flood­ing rose in sev­er­al places along the 14-mile stretch.

Mo­torists with high ve­hi­cles ven­tured through the floods, but the low­er ve­hi­cles parked along­side Scotts Road wait­ing for the floods to sub­side.

Speak­ing to Guardian Me­dia, Pres­i­dent of the South Oropouche River­ine Flood Ac­tion Group, Ed­ward Mood­ie, said most of the con­nec­tor roads in Bar­rack­pore, Pe­nal and Debe had a wa­ter cross­ing the road.

"The wa­ter is back­ing up right up to Ra­goo­nanan Trace. Su­chit Trace is un­der wa­ter and we have some flood­ing ris­ing in Clarke Road as well. In Debe, the wa­ter went down but a lot of the back­traces re­main high," Mood­ie said.

He al­so said the Wood­land Bank has a big breach.

"Wa­ter is flow­ing heav­i­ly in­to Wood­land we are call­ing on the Min­istry of Works to bring in an­oth­er pump to pull that wa­ter out now. Wood­land is the most ne­glect­ed area, so it is worst hit," said Mood­ie.

"For­tu­nate­ly, most peo­ple can get out be­cause of the al­ter­na­tive routes. We ex­pect it to get worse be­cause of the wa­ter ris­ing and the tide be­ing high. Thank­ful­ly the rain driz­zled last night and there were no re­al heavy rains," he said.

He al­so said the pumps have been func­tion­ing at Tul­sa Trace but not­ed that this was not suf­fi­cient to pull the amount of wa­ter which was brought in­to the South Oropouche Drainage Basin via the Bhag­ma­nia and Trinidad Rivers.

"With­out a pump, we can­not es­cape floods.  We need an­oth­er pump in Wood­land. The gates in St John are op­er­a­tional but the 14 gates in Wood­land are not ful­ly op­er­a­tional," he added.

Guardian Me­dia will bring you more as this sto­ry de­vel­ops.