In a near reversal of what occurred during 2004’s Hurricane Ivan, Grand Cayman escaped a crushing blow from Hurricane Paloma over the weekend while the Sister Islands took the brunt of the storm.
Forecasters had expected Paloma to strike the southern and western coast of the largest island in Cayman as a lower-power Category 3 storm Friday night. However, the storm’s track took a bizarre shift to the northeast Friday afternoon and evening, pushing it east of Grand Cayman and on a collision course with Little Cayman instead.
The hurricane struck the Sister Islands as a monster Category 4 storm early Saturday. (See related article in today’s paper)
Even those Grand Cayman residents who were affected by the hurricane were thanking their lucky stars on Saturday morning.
“The water came up, but unlike Ivan, we didn’t have a surge and this water will go down,” said Ruth Gooden who’s Anthony Street home was surrounded by flood waters Saturday.
The main island did sustain a fair bit of damage, but it was nothing compared to what occurred in the Sister Islands.
Homes flooded in George Town along Washington and Kennedy Avenues, as well as on Anthony Street overnight Friday. Royal Cayman Islands Police actually had to rope off the intersection of Anthony and Templeton streets so motorists wouldn’t go driving through.
Several houses also flooded in the Cumber Avenue area of Bodden Town, forcing government officials to temporarily open a shelter at the Bodden Town Civic Centre for residents who couldn’t go home. However, by Saturday evening that shelter was closed down.
In East End, the part of Grand Cayman closest to the storm, both Morritts Tortuga resort and the Reef Resort sustained water damage. Eyewitnesses reported flood waters getting into the first floor of the Reef Resort and some leakage causing damage at Morritts.
West Bay saw the least amount of damage of any island district with just a few downed power lines and fallen trees reported.
There were no major injuries reported from the storm on Grand Cayman.
By Saturday afternoon, Caribbean Utilities Company had restored power to 90 per cent of its customers and full power was restored by Sunday.
Forecast storm surges of four to six feet for Seven Mile Beach and North West Point Road simply didn’t materialise as Paloma veered further to the northeast.
“The storm wasn’t so bad actually, it was just the wind that frightened me,” Harriet Vassell said. “I was up all night looking out the window but you couldn’t see anything.”
Police reported very little crime occurring during the and after the storm. There was one burglary attempt made at an electronics store in Pasadora Place shopping centre overnight between Friday and Saturday. RCIPS officers searched the area but no arrests were made.
A stabbing was reported in the vicinity of Pepper’s nightclub Saturday night, with one victim transported to hospital. A suspect was arrested in that incident.
Communications problems
Just before tropical storm force winds began impacting Grand Cayman Friday afternoon, landline phones, e-mail and some internet communications were lost at the Emergency Operations Centre. The police operations centre at the aviation communications building reported similar problems.
Government Information Services officials said Friday that most emergency communications were being done by cell phone Friday afternoon.
It was uncertain what caused the outage, but it was not believed to be storm-related.
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