Hurricane Dean

I read an article today in our local paper (online, of course, with my internet addiction what did you expect?). There is a gas shortage on our sister island. People waited in line for hours to put gas in their cars. With their cars running no doubt. This will probably affect the island I'm on soon enough. The shortage is due to rough seas. When everything has to be delivered by boat, rough seas are a problem. This reminded me of what happened last August.

There's a reason that most people don't go to the Caribbean in the fall. It's called Hurricane Season. Hurricanes are a real risk for those of us living down here. Not only do they do serious damage to the islands but necessities can become scarce.

Last August we watched Tropical Storm Dean head straight for us. Models were projecting that it would hit us dead on. We watched it develop into a Category 3 hurricane (by the time it was all over it was a Category 5 storm but at the time it crossed the Lesser Antilles it was only a 3). Models kept changing but it looked like it was turning a little to the south. Maybe it wouldn't hit it after all. We were told to prepare. Even though the eye of the storm probably wouldn't hit our island, we were to expect strong winds and heavy rain. Basically, a tropical storm.

This was our first Hurricane Season. We probably over prepared. I'm ok with that. We made a list. We looked at the lists online. We bought non-perishable food. We bought first aid items. The one thing we didn't have was bottled water.

After a storm it's not really safe to drink tap water. If you have any running water at all. It's not advisable to drink the tap water here anyway. Unless you want to get sick. We always buy bottled water. So it wasn't like we didn't have *any* water, but we didn't have the 7-10 days supply (per person) that is recommended. It was more like 2-3 days. For both of us and the cats. Yeah, we prepared for them too. Of course.

The reason for our lack of water? There was no bottled water. The stores sold out. Quickly. When would they be getting more? Would they be getting more? Umm, well, you see the water is bottled here on the island. We don't actually import the water. Just the bottles. But the company that bottles the water ran out of bottles. The bottles were coming on a ship. But because rough seas (due to the hurricane) the bottles could not be delivered. No bottles=no bottled water. The company that bottles the water SHUT DOWN. They would reopen once the bottles were delivered.

It's not like we had options. We just had to accept the fact that we would have next to no water if the hurricane hit us. Why yes, it was annoying. I guess we would have boiled water on the grill (we have a small grill and had lots of charcoal and waterproof matches) if we had to.

We got lucky. Hurricane Dean hit an island about 150 miles to our south. We had tropical storm strength winds. For about a day. We went to the beach to get pictures. It was windy, raining, and cold. We lost power for most of the day. Could have been a lot worse.