8.30 am Wednesday 20th Oct 99: Slept clean through from 2.30 to 7.00 am. It's noisy but that's been the worst of it so far. I'm in my apartment on the second floor and it's calm enough and dry enough for me to walk outside and take photos. I set the camera on a fast shutter speed to freeze the action and as you can see its hard to know they were taken in the midst of a hurricane. You can see my wife, Gloria , wondering about in the garden. The only hint of wind speed is the shredding bananas leaves. I estimate winds about 35 mph, enough to rattle the roof and shake the trees but that's about all.

The sea is up but not as much as you would expect. You can see it breaking around Prickly Pear Island. The shots looking over Hodges Bay look like an average summer's day in England. It's a little more intimidating than that, just from the sound effects alone.

No big deal so far. More later.

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10.00 am Wednesday 20th Oct 99: Winds are picking up a little.... perhaps gusting to 50 mph. It's hazier with very light showers..... in fact I can't see Prickly Pear at all now. The anticipated rainfall has been a disappointment so far. We were hoping to fill up our cisterns but there has been very little precipitation. Still hoping this is as bad as it gets.

11.30 am Wednesday 20th Oct 99: No sooner had I posted the info above than the rain started in earnest. Visibility is down to 100 yards and rain is now intense enough (maybe gusting to 70 mph) for me to start worrying about our security up here. The estimate all indicated that it wouldn't get much above 80 mph but this storm is accelerating like crazy.

11.40 am Wednesday 20th Oct 99: rain is pounding on the patio doors to my office at an alarming rate. This is clearly stronger than 80 mph. The whole glass patio doors are bending.

11.44 am Wednesday 20th Oct 99: I have to shut down now. Rain is streaming in horizontally around the doors and flooding the floor. Attempts to mop up are useless. I'm writing this with my feet in half an inch of water. Wind velocity is up too... maybe gusting to 100 mph or more. I hear the roof tiles shifting over the apartment. Water is now coming in through the roof so I have to shut down and try to protect my equipment.

Later.

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3.17 pm Wednesday 20th Oct 99: I'm downstairs in the main house now. That got really scary. It was a race to disconnect and cover my system and get ready to evacuate the area. My wife Gloria was clearly rattled. It's so easy in unpredictable circumstances to react rather than act. You have to ignore what's happening around you and get on with the job in hand but I guess we both thought the windows were coming in.

I stopped looking at my watch so I can't be sure what time any particular event took place. I taped my system and other valuables into industrial grade garbage bags that I had standing by for such an event. I was ready to leave everything there and get Gloria down below if the twin patio doors blew. It looked like they would. Our apartment is on the second floor so wind velocity is increased. Into the bargain, the wind was driving straight in from the sea and although we have a high hedge to protect the lower level, there is nothing to buffer the upper level as the wind accelerates across the ocean. At one point the doors distorted enough to jump the door catch and slip open half an inch. the force of the rain bent the door towards me as I wrestled to close it. Its was fouling on the frame and I feared the glass would shatter. We had about 8 of Gloria's parrots in the apartment with us and I knew that if the doors blew she would want to save the birds, but there would be no hope for that. I had tied a safety rope down the outside stairway to the lower level. I wasn't sure we could make it but I knew we couldn't move the birds. they would have to take their chance. I used a screw driver wedged in the door frame to guide the door into the frame as I slammed it shut. Once in place I locked it tight.

I think it was about 20 minutes after I shut down the computer that the wind suddenly reduced to about 35 mph and I knew instantly from the experience of hurricane Georges that the eye was about to pass over us.

I grabbed a bag of valuables and made my way down the stairs to the back yard. It was a terrible mess. Almost all the trees were broken which seemed odd because the bushes were not stripped of leaves as they usually are in a hurricane. One of our 500 gallon water tanks had blown over. There was dirt, broken tree limbs and flooding in every step as I picked my way into the kitchen down stairs. This is the area I usually go when we expect a bad hurricane. There is a concrete roof there and the walls are made of stone blocks so I know we are safe there. Making my way back for another load the wind was dropping off and the sky lightened. The trouble is that you never know how long the eye will last. Think of the eye as a dinner plate. If you are lined up with the center of the plate it is a long way clear across to the other side, but if you are close to one side the distance before you hit the rim again is very short. In a hurricane the plate is so big that you don't know if your lined up with the center or the side and you may have an hour of respite or just a few minutes.

I began hurriedly moving my system piece by piece up and down the stairs. Gloria was grabbing our other valuables, electrical items, personal items, flashlights etc too. There were also some other precious documents I wanted to save. Original photos from my film work and a book dedicated to my by George Lucas when we made the first Star Wars movie.

The generator had been running since the power went off about 8.00 am so I shut it down and prepared to refill it when I heard Gloria cry out. We had brought in all of her 30 odd parrots except one pair of black headed caiques. They were on eggs and since the storm wasn't expected to be too bad we moved them the shortest distance to an area where the house protects them on three sides. From the forecast wind direction they should have been on the lee of the house but the eye ran right over us and drove in on them so hard that their 6 foot avery was flipped upside down and covered with debris. As we dug it out we could see the soaked birds. One was close to death. It's eyes were rolling. The other hung grimly to the side of the cage, soaked and shivering. I kept looking at the sky anticipating that the storm might resume at any moment. It is very difficult to dislodge a bird one handed as you stretch in through a 12 inch door. We didn't have time to cut them out. I could see the weather deteriorating. The eye had lasted over 40 minutes as it was. The birds were gripping the bars for dear life and the more lively one wanted to bite us for our trouble. I got the semi conscious one into an open cardboard box. It was so weak I had no qualms about leaving it there while we manhandled the cage so that I could get to the feet while Gloria stretched across to get bitten. I dislodged the toes roughly hoping I wasn't breaking them but knowing we couldn't get caught out there and Gloria, known locally as the parrot lady) wouldn't go back in and just leave him there. It must have taken over ten minutes but eventually we had him in the box and I went back to the generator while Gloria whisked the invalids inside.

The sky was getting black again as I poured the diesel into the generator. I knew the eye was almost past. The wind was back up to 30 mph or so and the fuel poured diagonally into the tank. I started her up and dashed inside.

Inside the house there was a lot of flooding too. We had covered the furniture with huge plastic sheets and puddles 4 or 5 inches deep formed in our huge 8 seater sofa. Although it was wet I knew it was secure and proceeded to mop up as Gloria set up a heat lamp for the sick birds. I didn't hold out much hope for the semi conscious one but thought that the male might make it. The key is to offset shock by raising the body temperature as quickly as possible.... no you don't put them in the microwave! You use a 75 watt lamp close to the side of the cage and the birds will move closer to, or farther from, it according to their needs. Incredibly the female began to rally as the male preened her and after an hour they looked back in the land of the living.

The second half of the storm is clearly not going to be such a problem for us. As the eye crosses the wind reverses end pounds in on the other side of the island. English Harbour is probably getting it now.

It took an hour or so to reassemble the computer but the phones are out and I won't be able to post any of this until they get fixed.

5.42 pm Wednesday 20th Oct 99: The weather has settled right down again. Winds are back around 40 mph and the rain is reduced to a constant drizzle. We mopped up 12 buckets of water from the kitchen and are starting on the reception rooms. Remarkably none of the paintings appear damaged. We had bagged up the delicate watercolors before the storm hit so those and our prints are safe.

9.26 pm Wednesday 20th Oct 99: Lost of rain and a blustery night. We are going back up stairs to mop up there.

7.14 pm Thursday 21st Oct 99: We crashed out about midnight last night and awoke to a cold (50's) damp day. I'm going down to check out my boat at Jolly Harbour and all further reports will be posted on the damage report page.

Footnote: One of our phone lines dried out and started working late Friday the 22nd and I was able to post these reports.

Amazingly both birds survived their ordeal.

If you want to send a report or query by email that's OK but be aware that it may take me a while to get back to you.

 

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