Local businesses hit severely by ‘never before seen’ flash flood
It was a sight of devastation and sadness on the faces of business owners and staff as they were cleaning and trying to salvage what they could from the flood.
Bolo’s hard hit
Our newsroom was reliably informed that Bolo’s Department Store suffered a “massive loss” to the lower section of the building, adding that they are currently assessing the damages to report to their insurance company.
Bolo’s Department Store will remain closed as cleaning efforts are still taking place, a source from the business establishment stated.
“We cleaned & we cleaned…”
Bobby’s Supermarket was also badly affected but that did not stop it from opening up its doors for business yesterday August 10, 2017.
According to a store clerk, the supermarket was filled with thick muddy water when workers turned up for work on Tuesday August 8, 2017.
“We cleaned and we cleaned and it was like we were never going to finish because it had so much mud throughout the supermarket. Eventually, we got most of the muddy water out but we are still cleaning as you can still see some of the residue on the floor.”
Sales!
People’s Shoe Store, along with many other stores, was seen having a sale on items that were affected by the flooding waters.
Royal Cell was open but information reaching our news site was that it lost 80 percent of its products.
While the majority of the businesses in Road Town are open to customers, they are currently assessing damages to report to their various insurance companies.
Unanimously, business owners agreed that this is the worst flooding they have ever seen and it is going to take a while before things can go back to normal. They also stated that it is going to be very expensive to repair what was damaged.
Meanwhile, Public Works Department and the BVI Electricity Corporation (BVIEC) have been working to address pocket areas where roads have been blocked or without electricity.
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10 Responses to “Local businesses hit severely by ‘never before seen’ flash flood”
Is the VI a member of Caribbean Disaster Emergency Management Agency (CDEMA)? And if so what is CDEMA in regards to to recovery and relief? Though the disaster is a painful setback for the territory economically, it may be a lesson and opportunity for the need of better drainage system design, conatruction and design. Proper drainage is critical to the effective funtioning, maintaining the structural integrity and maintaining the sustainability of the road infrastructure. From my vantage point, suggest looking at installing a drainage pump station(s) on Wickhams Cay/Road Town. A major rain event as just occurred, coupled with high, will present a hydraulic restriction that will cause flood waters to stack up stream, resulting in flooding.