Northern Belize Issued Flood Alert Due to Remnants of Hurricane Agatha

A flood alert has been issued by the National Met Service and NEMO for flood-prone areas along northern Belize. Chief Meteorologist Ronald Gordon told News Five today that while Hurricane Agatha which struck the southern part of Mexico’s Pacific coast posed no threat to Belize, the storm’s remnants are expected to move towards the Yucatan, dumping heavy rains in its path. That has caused over four inches of rainfall in parts of northern Belize and an additional two to four inches are likely within the next couple of days.

Ronald Gordon

Ronald Gordon, Chief Meteorologist, National Meteorological Service

“The system will re-emerge over the northwest Caribbean Sea or the southern Gulf of Mexico, where currently there’s a low chance of it re-developing into a tropical depression or tropical storm in forty-eight hours or a high chance that it does so in about five days. In terms of the impacts of the remnants of Agatha on Belize, we expect that to be mostly in the form of rain. With all that rainfall, the threat from this system will be the possibility of flooding to occur, and currently we are focusing mostly in the north due to the fact that that area is getting the most rainfall. However, we should not discount that other parts of the country will also be receiving significant rainfall, so the alert is in general for flood-prone areas of the country to be on alert and to be prepared to move in the case that they need to do so. If you’re moving livestock, it’s going to take a while, so certainly that is something that I think folds should have been preparing for from as early as we issued the flood watch to know if you’re going to be moving or if you need to move your assets and livestock away from low-lying and flood-prone areas. I want to put this in perspective, though, we expect a significant amount of rainfall but certainly we do not expect the amount of rainfall that we saw from Eta or Iota .in 2020 to occur.”

NEMO warns people in the cayes, along rivers, creeks, and low-lying areas, as well as farmers and fishermen to be alert and take the necessary actions to save life, livestock and property. Drivers are also asked to drive with caution and use their hazard lights when driving in the rain.