All Di­vi­sions of the Trinidad and To­ba­go Po­lice Ser­vice cur­rent­ly are on high alert, and in­creased pa­trols have been ac­ti­vat­ed to ren­der sup­port to first re­spon­ders op­er­at­ing dur­ing the cur­rent se­vere weath­er alert cov­er­ing the coun­try.

And Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice (Ag) Mc Don­ald Ja­cob is urg­ing the pub­lic to ex­er­cise cau­tion and good judge­ment, dur­ing the cur­rent flood­ing cri­sis.

In an of­fi­cial state­ment is­sued to­day, the top cop re­mind­ed the pub­lic about the dan­gers of tra­vers­ing flood­wa­ters and sig­nif­i­cant risks from rivers at max­i­mum ca­pac­i­ty or over­flow­ing.  He al­so pro­vid­ed tips on how to “to re­duce the risk of harm and in­jury”.

“Riv­er flows can be very un­pre­dictable as they can de­scend at a high rate of speed from high­er moun­tain­ous ar­eas, car­ry­ing with it de­bris and tox­ic chem­i­cals and their force can quick­ly de­stroy roads, bridges, and cause land­slides. It is im­por­tant to stay away from flood­wa­ter, in­clud­ing walk­ing or dri­ving, as much as pos­si­ble,” Ag Com­mis­sion Ja­cob said in the re­lease.

“The TTPS has not­ed so­cial me­dia clips show­ing per­sons tak­ing un­nec­es­sary risks to record videos on the edge of com­pro­mised river­banks and road­ways to ob­tain “vi­ral” footage,” he ob­served.  “We are ap­peal­ing to per­sons to ex­er­cise greater cau­tion dur­ing these times as sub­sur­face dam­ages to roads or em­bank­ments would not be vis­i­ble and such sit­u­a­tions can quick­ly lead to se­ri­ous in­jury or death.”

The top cop points to sev­er­al road­ways which have been ren­dered dan­ger­ous or im­pass­able, be­cause of dam­age sus­tained in the cur­rent rough weath­er—Man­zanil­la Ma­yaro Road, Gran Cou­va, and the La­dy Young Road.

“Avoid dri­ving in flood prone ar­eas, be pre­pared and plan an al­ter­nate route in case the road you want to use is closed,” he ad­vised.  “If you find your­self on a road that is flood­ed, the best choice is to turn around if you can do so safe­ly. If a road is marked as closed, do not con­tin­ue.”

He added: “We wish again to re­mind mo­torists that flood­wa­ters can quick­ly sweep away ve­hi­cles. Flood­wa­ters can eas­i­ly cause loss of con­trol and pos­si­ble stalling and dam­age to the me­chan­i­cal and elec­tri­cal com­po­nents of your ve­hi­cle.  Wa­ter can al­so hide dips and pot­holes in the road, as well as sub­merged trees or downed pow­er lines. With­out be­ing able to see the road's sur­face, you may hit some­thing and cause ma­jor dam­age to your ve­hi­cle, in ad­di­tion to pos­si­ble flood dam­age.”

Ag Com­mis­sion Ja­cob re­minds the pub­lic that be­fore trav­el­ling, check for up­dates from the Trinidad and To­ba­go Me­te­o­ro­log­i­cal Ser­vice and Of­fice of Dis­as­ter Pre­pared­ness and Man­age­ment for the lat­est road con­di­tions.

And he of­fered keen ad­vice for night dri­ving in ad­verse weath­er con­di­tions:

“Dri­vers are al­so re­mind­ed to be ex­tra cau­tious when dri­ving at night as it will be more dif­fi­cult to spot haz­ards. If your ve­hi­cle stalls in flood­wa­ter, be pre­pared to aban­don it, and move safe­ly to high­er ground.”

The Act­ing Com­mis­sion­er con­firmed that all Di­vi­sions, Sec­tions and Branch­es of the TTPS are on high alert, with in­creased pa­trols li­ais­ing di­rect­ly with the OCC, ODPM and Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tions for im­me­di­ate sup­port.

He en­cour­aged the pub­lic to call the 999 Emer­gency Hot­line to have first re­spon­ders dis­patched quick­ly in the event of an emer­gency or should some­one be­come strand­ed.