Storm wreaks havoc on San Pedro
The town of San Pedro on Ambergris Caye is often described in tourist brochures as a tropical paradise. That may be true, but as the bible reminds us, paradise is not without its problems. For San Pedro the problems of the last few years have been hurricanes and fires…and despite the approaching height of the hurricane season, no one was prepared for the upheaval that struck the town last night. News 5’s Jacqueline Woods reports.
Jacqueline Woods, Reporting
Overturned planes, smashed boats and houses without roofs suggest that whatever hit San Pedro Thursday night was more than a thunderstorm.
Julie Spalding, Bartender, BC’s Bar and Grill
“The first thing I thought was…a hurricane because when I looked up at the sky I saw like smoke, I saw like little sparks of fire.”
Raines Flowers, Resident, San Pedro
“I was just sticking my head out the window and I see like from a distance this big ball of smoke coming. And for a minute I thought it was fire or something, but I didn’t hear no fire engine nothing.”
Jacqueline Woods
“From what direction did you see it coming?”
Raines Flowers
“From seawards, it was coming straight from the ocean.”
Katherine Crown, Tourist
“We couldn’t see what was coming, we just felt it coming in and hitting us. And it seemed to come kind of this way and that way both at the same time. And they thought it was a waterspout, then they’re saying this morning it was a tornado.”
Jacqueline Woods
“Do you believe it was a tornado?”
Victorio Barbosa, Resident, San Pedro
“I believe, it could only be that because a storm, when it’s going to rain you first feel the breeze and so, but this noh, this came all of a sudden with everything.”
Katherine Crown, a tourist from the United States was sitting with her family and friends having a late night bite to eat at BC’s Bar and Grill when the weather made a sudden change. Crown says it was around 10:30 when the breeze grew eerily calm. Then, without warning came a strong gust of wind.
Katherine Crown
“A sudden wind came and it got really cold and then things started blowing all over the place. Pizza boxes blowing all over, all the food blowing all over. The beer bottles, my son went to take a sip of beer and the bottle went down there. And then we hit the floor. I was on the floor, something hit me on the head, my daughter-in-law was on the floor also, something hit her on the head too and we had a couple gashes and lumps. And then my son-in-law grabbed me and pulled me into a closet. But everything was all over the place, strewn all over the place.”
Next door at Aqua Dives, three boats were damaged when this twenty-eight foot boat was picked up and thrown on top of two other vessels.
Emil Cano, Front Desk Manager, Aqua Dives
“This one over this side is down, we have some damages sustained to several other ones on this side, since it flipped it on top of one another. But this one, on the other side it’s pretty extensively damaged, I think this one is down.”
From the beachfront, the system then made its way across to the island’s airstrip.
Jacqueline Woods
“At the San Pedro airstrip, the system damage two of Maya Island’s airplanes. The company says the damages could cost as much as a million Belize dollars.”
Fernando Trejo, Managing Director, Maya Island Air
“Well we have two airplanes that are completely damaged and that’s it.”
Jacqueline Woods
“They were parked safely on the tarmac?”
Fernando Trejo
“Yeah, they were parked right here.”
The swath of destruction continued to the back of the island where it hit the boatyard; ironically a place that was lashed mercilessly by Hurricane Keith in 2000.
Michael Caldwell, Owner, Sunset Bar
“We had about fifty people in the bar and had a pretty good party going on. A little bit of rain and then the wind picked up a little bit and then it turned loose on us. A little tornado came right across the bar directly across our dance floor here. We all got into a corner and ducked down and held on real tight.”
Eight boats, a golf cart and dock were extensively damaged.
Michael Caldwell
“We lost our roof and a lot of tables and chairs and some damage to some TVs and stereos and stuff, so we lost probably ten of fifteen thousand dollars last night.”
From the boat yard, the wicked weather made its way across the lagoon and into the heart of San Pedrito. One house was moved eight feet off its foundation, while three houses lost their roofs.
Victorio Barbosa, Resident, San Pedro
“I just heard a little, like the noise coming. All of a sudden the door was thrown inside, so I dashed myself under the table and told my wife to dash down to the floor. But in that instance everything was gone.”
Jacqueline Woods
“Roof everything?”
Victoris Barbosa
“Everything was gone. That has a…well if the house took the hurricane’s hundred and sixty miles, I believe this was much stronger.”
John Moro’s house was the last hit before the phantom menace finally headed out into the lagoon.
John Moro
“I was laying here in the bed about 10:30 when the tornado passed with a lot of wind and a lot of sand and rain that was right through to my windows and my doors. And when I was here in my bed I saw a big piece of zinc drop right through to the floor. And from that I go right through to the ground and I tried to go right through to the last door that was in the back of this house and I went right through to one of my neighbours.”
Jacqueline Woods
“Could this have been forecasted and could the residents been forewarned?”
Justin Hulse, Deputy Chief Meteorologist
“Well our forecast last night for thunderstorms was a general forecast, not for extremely intense thunderstorms. We were going for small craft caution at sea for all the small boats to be cautious in the thunderstorms because near thunderstorms you get like sudden gusts up to maybe forty-five miles per hour. It’s not the normal damage, it’s one of two thunderstorms, the really intense thunderstorms do this.”
While the weather bureau maintains that it was just a strong squall, the people who lived through it are convinced that whatever hit San Pedro was something much more severe.
Michael Caldwell
“It was a tornado. I lived up in tornado alley up in the States. When it picks up a golf cart and moves it fifty yards and drops it again, it’s a tornado.”
But even if this event is never officially classified as a tornado, Thursday night’s experience will serve as a reminder–as if San Pedranos needed one–that when it comes to weather, we can never be too prepared. Reporting for News 5, Jacqueline Woods.
Waterspouts, which are small tornadoes occurring over water, have been spotted on a number occasions up and down the coast, including in front of San Pedro.
