Barbados Prime Minister Directs Urgent Cleanup of Hurricane-Damaged Sea Port for Prompt Reopening

Prime Minister Mia Mottley has instructed sea port officials to act with urgency to reopen the island’s main bulk trading gateway after it took a battering from Hurricane Beryl which hit Barbados on Monday with gale force winds.

Mottley, who visited the port of entry during the afternoon as part of a tour of the worst affected areas, told management present that a clean up of the facility must be done as quickly as possible, especially in light of another weather system due to strike the island on Wednesday.

In fact, she asked the Chairman and the Chief Executive Officer of the Barbados Port Inc David Jean-Marie to call an emergency board meeting for Monday night to address the restoration of the compound which had been inundated with possibly tons of rocks and other debris washed onto the land by unusually high sea surges.

“The immediate need is to bring the port to as operational as soon as possible. That means moving all of those rocks that have come in from the ocean floor…. There is damage on shore and in the water,” Mottley said.

“The port has really taken a battering, both on land and in the water. I am told that two vessels sunk, the Jolly Roger – which is already, because it is wood, started to dissipate and some of it has started to float out – [and] the Dreamchaser, which has gone down below.”.

The prime minister said she would await the report from the port as to what it will do and how long the clean up process would take, bearing in mind the planned arrival of a cruise ship in a couple of days. (EJ)