Fol­low­ing the par­tial col­lapse of the Solomon Ho­choy High­way Ex­ten­sion, sec­re­tary of the Fish­er­men and Friends of the Sea (FFOS) Gary Aboud is­sued a warn­ing to the gov­ern­ment that build­ing in man­groves or on the edge of wet­lands was ill-ad­vised.

Aboud said, “What has hap­pened to­day at Mos­qui­to Creek is that $281 mil­lion has washed away. It is symp­to­matic of what is to come in the fu­ture.”

He ex­plained that the col­lapse oc­curred be­cause of liq­ue­fac­tion, which is a ge­o­log­i­cal term used to de­scribe soil that is loose­ly packed and wa­ter-logged near the ground sur­face. 

“Are these un­sta­ble sed­i­ments like­ly to be re­spon­si­ble for the col­lapse of the re­cent Mos­qui­to Creek High­way and will the Con­trac­tor or the good Min­is­ter pay for this cat­a­stro­phe?

While hun­dreds of thou­sands of our peo­ple are suf­fer­ing this COVID pan­ic, why are we at­tempt­ing to build a high­way in man­grove ar­eas where sci­ence has warned that liq­ue­fac­tion is bound to oc­cur?” he asked.

He not­ed, “In 2018 ac­claimed en­gi­neer­ing seis­mol­o­gist, Dr Il­lias Pa­padopolous warned of the pos­si­bil­i­ty of such an oc­cur­rence in Port-of-Spain.”

Aboud said the coun­try should be ashamed of the wastage.

“We should learn from Mos­qui­to Creek and pre­pare for fu­ture cat­a­stro­phes at In­vaders Bay and oth­er sim­i­lar ar­eas,” he added.