Belladrum couple almost lose home to high winds

A couple at Belladrum, West Coast Berbice almost lost their home during a pummeling by heavy winds yesterday morning.

At around 8am, Beryl Thomas, 57, said, the winds fiercely shook the house, causing boards to become loose. She said too that zinc sheets were also ripped from both the outdoor bathroom and from her sheep and fowl pens. The flying zinc sheets chopped the electrical and telephone wires.

Although she was afraid to stay in the house after, Thomas did venture in briefly to check on the damage. Luckily, she said, only a wardrobe mirror was broken and a lot of dust was covering the floor and furniture.

Beryl Thomas standing among the ruins
Beryl Thomas standing among the ruins

She told Stabroek News that she was on the dam taking her five-year-old granddaughter to school when she noticed the zinc sheets “flying” and ran back home.

Her husband, Hamilton Innis, was under the house at the time and he “ran upstairs to close the windows. He quickly ran back down to safety because by then the house had started to shake really bad.

Thomas said some of the zinc sheets that were blown away were supposed to be used to renovate her house while the tarpaulin was covering the new boards.

She was “thankful to God that it wasn’t worse. If the breeze had continued for five more minutes I coulda lose my house.”