The Maritime Administration Department (MARAD) has warned that all vessels navigating in Guyana’s waters from today up to March 15 and from March 23-31 should navigate with extreme caution as a result of predicted exceptionally high tides, waves and winds.
In a notice in today’s Stabroek News, MARAD says that all operators, passengers and fishermen on vessels operating offshore are reminded to wear life-jackets and have all other life-saving equipment secured on board.
The notice comes as the south and eastern Caribbean braces for a frontal system this weekend.
A separate advisory from the Ministry of Public Works in today’s Guyana Chronicle noted that the US’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has warned of an Atlantic gale coming from the north west and which will result in offshore wind speeds of up to 35 knots. “This condition is likely to generate intense storm surges and above normal wave heights resulting in hazardous offshore and nearshore coastal conditions along the Atlantic coast”, the Ministry advisory said.
The highest tide for the period will be on Monday, March 11, 2013 at 4.04 pm. The advisory said that the Sea and River Defence Department considers the following areas to be particularly vulnerable to flooding as a result of storm surges which may cause overtopping:
-Onderneeming/Zorg, Cullen/Perseverance, Huist T’Dieren/Airy Hall, Essequibo Coast
-Zeelandia, Moor Farm, Marionville/Bendorff – Wakenaam Island
-Cane Garden, Blenheim/Endeavour, Success/Thierens – Leguan island
-Rotterdam/Crane, Anna Catherina/Cornelia Ida, Groenveldt/Leonora
-Parika, Vreed-en-Hoop (Plastic City), La Retraite – West Demerara
-Along Water Street – Georgetown, Kitty to Ogle, along the Mahaica River Banks – East Coast Demerara
-Abary/Profit, Hope/Washington – West Coast Berbice
-Along the banks of the Berbice and Canje Rivers.
Similar conditions in the middle of January led to waves crashing over the seawall along the East Coast highway and crippling traffic along the thoroughfare. Residents there had said they had seen nothing like it before.
The local meteorological office in a statement issued then had said: “The Coastal Guyana has been under threat by spring tides since Tuesday 8th Jan 2013. Unfortunately, on Monday 14th Jan 2013 a frontal system passed through the Atlantic, just north east of the Lesser Antilles. This supported increase in wind flow/speeds resulting from this weather system coupled with the spring tides would have created the type of storm surges experience yesterday afternoon along Guyana’s coast.”
In Trinidad, sea bathers, small craft operators and persons involved in any other sea-related activities this weekend are being asked to exercise extreme caution as there is expected to be “large battering waves” along exposed coastlines.
Also, those residing along coastal areas are warned to be on the alert for above normal sea conditions.
The warnings were issued yesterday by the Trinidad and Tobago Meteorological Services, according to the Trinidad Express.
It stated that Numerical Weather Prediction (NWP) models forecast wave heights and swells to be in excess of 2.5 metres, with long periods between wave crests by last evening.
This would result in seas being rendered hazardous, particularly along exposed coasts of Trinidad and Tobago. Tobago was expected to experience the effects earlier than Trinidad, according to the release.
“This is generated by swells generated by the passage of a frontal system associated with Low Pressure System presently in the Western Atlantic. These swells are forecast to propagate to the Eastern Caribbean by Saturday March 9… All necessary measures must be taken to preserve life and property,” the release stated.
