http://www.jamaica-gleaner.com/glean...ead/lead3.html


'Emily' to pass south of Jamaica
published: Thursday | July 14, 2005


TROPICAL STORM Emily is maintaining its westward movement towards the central Caribbean area. However, the National Meteorological Centre said the storm is expected to pass just south of Jamaica.
The Met Service said the island is therefore expected to be affected by storm force winds and heavy rains if it maintains its current course. At 4:00 p.m. yesterday the centre of Emily was located about 205 kilometres south of Barbados, 220 kilometres eastsoutheast of Grenada and 1,900 kilometres east-southeast of Jamaica.
Yesterday, the island of Tobago began feeling the effects of Emily. The high winds and torrential rains brought on by the storm uprooted trees, disconnected powerlines and triggered landslides. This prompted the government to issue an advisory urging employers to send home workers early on the Trinidad mainland. Commercial activities were brought to a halt from very early as businesses closed their doors in preparation for the storm.
STATE OF EMERGENCY
In Grenada, the government has declared a state of emergency and has imposed a curfew as that country braced for the impact of the storm. Emily is expected to also affect the neighbouring islands of St. Vincent and the Grenadines and St. Lucia.
The tropical cyclone, the fifth since the start of the hurricane season, continues to travel westward near 30 kilometres per hour, two kilometres less than the day before, with wind speeds of 95 kilometres per hour and higher gusts. Emily is not expected to become a hurricane before passing the Windward Islands.
In the meantime, fishers and other small craft operators in Jamaica are being urged to pay special attention to subsequent advisories from the Met Service.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,162467,00.html

Hurricane Emily Pounds Windward Islands

St. GEORGE'S, Grenada—Hurricane Emily pounded Grenada early Thursday, packing sustained winds of about 90 mph.

"They took a major portion of the brunt of the storm," said Trisha Wallace, a forecaster with the National Hurricane Center (search) in Miami.

The storm was heading west, and a tropical storm watch was in effect for Aruba, Bonaire and Curacao, which Wallace said could expect heavy rain. According to the current forecast track, the storm could hit the southern coast of Texas by early next week.

Grenadians had rushed home or to shelters under heavy rain Wednesday, forming traffic jams in the capital of St. George's as the storm approached. The government had declared a state of emergency as a precaution.

The struggle to recover from last year's Hurricane Ivan (search) had prevented Grenada from thoroughly preparing for this year's hurricane season. Amid a shortage of construction supplies, many islanders still have no roofs and some children are still taught under tarps.

"If the situation gets worse then I'll have to go to the shelter but meantime I'll stick to my prayers," said Winston St. Bernard, 51.

Prime Minister Keith Mitchell (search) sought to reassure citizens the government would not be caught off-guard — as it was when Ivan killed 39 people and left a wasteland of ruined buildings in September.

At least 100 people evacuated to a shelter at a high school in the southeastern part of Grenada, said Angela Pierre, the shelter's manager. Thirty-five other shelters across the country also reported taking people in. The government declared a state of emergency as a precaution.

At 5 a.m. Thursday, the center of Hurricane Emily was about 45 miles northwest of Grenada, according to the National Hurricane Center. It was heading northwest at about 18 mph.

Commerce halted across much of the eastern Caribbean as Emily bore down.

BP oil company evacuated nonessential staff from its 14 offshore oil platforms in Trinidad (search), leaving 11 employees to operate two platforms to fulfill its contractual obligations to provide gas for the country, the company said.

In St. Vincent (search), people placed boards over window and businesses were supposed to close at noon, though some remained open amid a light drizzle and increasingly dark skies.

"We've got to be prepared and that's what we're doing," said Cordell Roberts, 39, a fisherman who was helping to pull boats from the water in the capital, Kingstown. "People are very conscious about the weather. It's not like the old days when we took it for granted."

St. Lucians also lined up at stores and the government ordered businesses to close in the afternoon. The island's two main airports remained opened, though British Airways canceled its flights from Hewanorra International Airport (search) in the south.

Emily trails Hurricane Dennis (search), which destroyed crops and killed at least 25 people in Haiti and 16 in Cuba last week, according to authorities in the two countries.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4678431.stm







Hurricane moves over E Caribbean







Fishermen in the region have been taking precautionsHurricane Emily has battered the eastern Caribbean island of Grenada, ripping off roofs and flooding streets.
Nearly 2,500 people fled to shelters, while others stayed at home with stockpiles of canned food and water.
Sustaining winds of nearly 90mph (145km/h) as it passed westwards over the country, the hurricane moved quickly away from the Windward Islands.
Grenada is still recovering from the more powerful Hurricane Ivan last year which destroyed 90% of homes.
A Grenadian disaster official, Sylvan McIntyre, told the BBC there were no reports of casualties so far, but he said there had been "significant damage" to houses.
Click here to see Hurricane Emily's course
In the Grenadian capital, St Georges, the storm also blew away the roof of the operating theatre at the main hospital and destroyed the roofs of two police stations in St Georges and Grenville.
"They [Grenada] took a major portion of the brunt of the storm," said Trisha Wallace, a forecaster with the US Hurricane Center in Miami quoted by AP news agency.
Rebuilding
Grenada has not been able to thoroughly prepare for this year's hurricane season as it is still trying to rebuild following Hurricane Ivan, which killed nearly 40 people in September.










Animated guide: Hurricanes
Grenada still scarredMany buildings still do not have roofs, partly because of a shortage of building materials. Officials have said it could take up to 10 years to recover.
After Emily left Grenada, the hurricane was downgraded to a tropical storm.
Tropical storm warnings have now been withdrawn for St Vincent and the Grenadines, where reports say a handful of roofs have been blown off.
As of 0800 local time, (1200 GMT), tropical storm warnings were still in place for much of the northern coast of Venezuela, and for the islands of Bonaire, Curacao and Aruba.
None of those areas are in the direct path of the storm, but US forecasters warned that heavy rain could trigger deadly flash floods and mudslides.
Hurricane projections often change because of the unpredictable nature of storms. Emily had been downgraded to a tropical storm by forecasters on Wednesday, but as the storm gathered strength it was again boosted to a hurricane.
Emily follows closely behind Hurricane Dennis, which caused more than two dozen deaths as it rampaged over Haiti, Jamaica, Cuba and Florida.

http://www.jamaica-gleaner.com/glean...ead/lead1.html

jamaica given official hurricane watch

ROYAL GEORGE..!!

And Grenada dont even recover from last year.



I wonder if George Bush have a team of environmental scientist stirring up things. Although in 1780/ 1781 there were two succesive hurricanes.

This may be of interest.

http://uncpress.unc.edu/chapters/burnard_mastery.html

The second great event was the hurricane of October 1780. Hurricanes frightened white Jamaicans as much as slave rebellions. Thistlewood experienced his first hurricane as early as 1751, as we have seen. It terrified and excited him in almost equal measure. The hurricane of October 1780, however, was a different matter. When Thistlewood compared the three hurricanes he had experienced (in 1751, 1780, and 1781), he ranked them on a scale of 1-10 as follows: "11th September, Violence or Force, not Velocity, say 6. 3rd October 1780, say 10. 1st August 1781, say 4."[20] The second hurricane was the most violent ever to strike the Caribbean in recorded history, and it made a direct hit on Westmoreland Parish. It devastated both the parish and Thistlewood, leaving "sad havoc all through the countryside." The loss of life was close to that in Tackey's revolt, and the physical destruction was considerably greater. At its height, the hurricane was "most tremendous, dreadful, awful & horrible…. [T]he elements of fire, air, water and earth seemed to be blended together … [and] it seemed as if a dissolution of nature was at hand." People could not stand upright in the force of the wind, and their clothes were torn from their bodies. "An old negroe man" who had "crept into an empty puncheon for shelter" was "carried over a high fence into a cane piece 2 or 3 hundred yards distance." The aftermath of the hurricane was as devastating as the hurricane itself; most trees were "blasted" and destroyed, and survivors were assailed by sickness that probably arose from lack of clean drinking water and the destruction of food supplies. Westmoreland bore "the appearance of the dreary mountains of Wales, in the winter season," with "not a blade of grass, nor leaf left or tree, shrub, or bush." Traveling to Savanna-la-Mar, Thistlewood found "the havock at the bay … past comprehension, an intolerable stench in the air, every thing rotting and such a great number of putrid carcasses laying unburied."[21] It also brought out the tensions in Jamaican society. Westmoreland whites feared that their slaves, "who were at that time exceeding turbulent & daring, well-knowing a number of Inhabitants had perished in the storm, and almost all our arms & ammunition destroyed," would take advantage of whites' desolation. Whites were "much afraid of the Negroes rising, they being very impudent."[22] Thistlewood's dwelling house had been destroyed, his prized garden had been flooded and ruined, virtually no trees remained upright, and he and his slaves faced the possibility of famine because of the scarcity of provisions. The British government, aware of the vast scale of destruction in its wealthiest colony, provided £40,000 sterling as a grant-in-aid.[23]

read more updates here

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4678431.stm

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,162584,00.html

seems grenada get hit now jamaica is in line

must find an hurricane fund where i can give at a least 5 quid or ten quid. every penny counts


http://stormcarib.com/shows emily is the fith tropical storm/hurricane this season and hurricane season ends november 30th

http://www.jamaica-gleaner.com/glean...ead/lead1.html

jamaica spared direct hit