Heavy rain, flood in Penal, Barrackpore

It was their first major flooding event for the rainy season but plagued perennially by the occurrence, residents of Rock Road, Penal and its environs are calling for better drainage.

Heavy rain began around 10 pm on July 16, with the passage of a tropical wave. While the rainfall lasted around three hours, its effects continued to be felt by many well into Wednesday.

By 1 am, there were social media reports of street and flash floods across Penal, Debe and Barrackpore.

By 9 am, the water receded in many parts of Rock Road, only remaining in areas most prone to being inundated, like in front of the Rock Road Hindu Primary School, Mulchan Trace and Goodman Trace, which were only accessible with high vehicles like pickups or trucks. The Ministry of Rural Development and Local Government said there were also reports of flooding in Lower Barrackpore and the Corner of GP Road and New Colonial Road, Barrackpore.

Unlike previous incidents, only a few homes were flooded in Penal.

When Newsday arrived around 10 am, Mulchan Trace resident Sunita Bachue said the almost knee-height water in front of her home was rising.

“The water is so high you can’t even come out to go nowhere...if you have an emergency, you can’t pass here.”

Fortunately for her, the water was not high enough to enter her home as it did in previous incidents. But she lamented that it was high enough to enter the garden she earns a livelihood from, damaging her crops.

Goodman Trace resident Sharon Isaac described the situation as horrible, expressing frustration over having to deal with floods once again.

“This is not something that we dealing with today. It has been going on for the past ten years and it’s absolutely sad and ridiculous.”

Isaac said she left for work as usual on Wednesday morning but her husband called around 8 am asking her to return home to move furniture and appliances out of the way because of the rising water. While she admitted Wednesday’s flooding was not as bad as previous incidents, she said it was still unfortunate.

Her garage and washing areas were flooded in about eight inches of water and the road leading to her house was under about a foot. She and her husband hurriedly placed their stove, fridge and cupboards on gas tanks and chairs to minimise their losses.

Bachue said she believes proper drainage is needed to alleviate flooding, which is now a recurring part of their lives.

“We need proper drainage because, in some places, the drain dry. The water have nowhere to go. If we had proper drainage, it would help with the flood.” Residents also expressed concern over the level of flooding experienced so early into the rainy season.

Newsday toured the area with Penal Debe Regional Corporation (PDRC) chairman Gowtam Maharaj and newly sworn-in Quinam/Morne Diablo councillor Sara Sookdeo. Several other residents complained to the corporation officials about the conditions of drains in the area and even alterations done by private developers.

Maharaj said the corporation has been on an aggressive drain-cleaning exercise. He said there are many drains under the remit of the Ministry of Works and Transport and the Ministry of Agriculture, which the PDRC also cleaned. He said some drains required repairs or upgrades but lamented that the corporation was not receiving the necessary funding to do the work.

“The call is also to be made for our project development funding, our PSIP in the order of $22 million, which has been approved by the national budget and this is almost the end of the financial year so it is really tough on the PDRC that no money has been released.”

On questions about people illegally backfilling land, Maharaj said: “Development works and backfilling and so on spans across the various agencies and definitely, as the regional corporation, we will be engaging (them). We’ve already started that process, which deals with Town and Country Planning, Ministry of Works - their drainage division, the corporation and all of the agencies.

“We’ll be looking at what are the solutions in terms of where there are development areas and now hindrances in terms of watercourses.”

Although he was not affected by flooding, Naresh Maharaj, a resident of Sammy Trace West, Lachoos Road, was left cleaning up his fabricating garage. Living on an incline, he said the rains caused a landslide, collapsing the garage’s wall.

He said he lost tools and materials.

Residents also told Newsday they were caught off-guard by the floods. In its 4.50 pm forecast on Tuesday, the TT Met Office warned for the night and Wednesday, there was a 60 per cent chance of thunderstorm activity over a few areas.

It said street and flash flooding and gusty winds are possible in the event of heavy downpours. The Met Office’s 6.16 am forecast on Wednesday was similar.

But by 8.41 am, the Met Office issued a yellow level adverse weather alert for Northern Trinidad and for Tobago, which went into effect at 10 am.

“A band of convergence to the east of Tobago is expected to be enhanced by favourable atmospheric features and generate broad areas of moderate to heavy showers as well as well as occasional thunderstorms. Rainfall over the past few days has resulted in saturated soils in some areas, particularly North East Tobago and northern Trinidad. With the forecast of further rainfall anticipated, there is the likelihood of landslides and toppling trees in the aforementioned and other vulnerable areas,” it said.

By midday, this alert was expanded to the whole country and its end time was extended to 8 pm. Although there was concern on social media about rivers in affected areas bursting their banks, the Met Office did not issue any riverine flood alerts up to Wednesday evening.

According to the Met Office’s five-day weather outlook, the axis of another tropical wave will make its way across the Lesser Antilles on Thursday, with associated weather reaching TT on Thursday morning. It said the Inter-Tropical Convergence Zone (ICTZ) is also likely to remain across the Windward Islands. Partly cloudy to cloudy conditions are likely, with light or moderate showers in some areas and a medium to high chance for an isolated heavy shower or thunderstorm development from early morning to late afternoon.

It said Friday would see partly cloudy conditions at times, becoming cloudy in some areas, with light or moderate showers and a medium chance for an isolated heavy shower or thunderstorm from early morning to late afternoon.

There were also reports of flooding in several areas in north and east Trinidad on Wednesday.

There was street flooding along the Eastern Main Road in Macoya; Warren Street, St Augustine; Penguin Crescent, Maloney; the Chaguanas Main Road; Connector Road, Chaguanas; Saddle Road in Santa Cruz, and the Aranguez Main Road.

Around midday, all eastbound lanes of the Churchill Roosevelt Highway past Orange Grove, Trincity, were flooded, with only two lanes remaining passable.