 | | The court yard at Heritage Collection Museum, East End |
It is the second time in recent years that such high levels of rainfall were recorded in Anguilla at once. The first deluge was during Hurricane Lenny in November 1999, when the flooding rose between 10 and 14 feet high in certain areas and in some instances just under the rooftops of houses.Though less severe, by far from that incident, the low pressure system which affected parts of the northeastern Caribbean on Sunday and on Monday this week, drenched Anguilla in a manner which was reminiscent of the 1999 flood.
 | | Newly-reconstructed section of the Queen Elizabeth Avenue |
This week’s flooding dangerously threatened the thresholds of some homes, particularly in the East End, Sandy Hill and Welches areas and in one or two cases reportedly led to hasty evacuations to escape high levels of water in yards. Principally, the flood waters covered The Valley Bottom where the well field is located and where the water table is thought to be at its peak; the Agricultural Department’s farmland from where animals had to be rescued and sheltered in Carnival Village at the Landsome Bowl Cultural Centre; the recently-reconstructed middle section of the Queen Elizabeth Avenue; the Anguilla Football Association playing field; sections of the Little Dix main and Sandy Hill roads; an area of East End where the pond, fed by rushing water from nearby elevations, covered the road and the yards of neighbours including Heritage Collection Museum, the Health Clinic and the old East End School.
A section of the road at Mount Fortune as well as adjoining land areas were also flooded; at Island Harbour the pond covered part of the road; vigorous streams of water from hillsides badly eroded a section of the beach; and wave action from the sea tore away the steps from one of the buildings of the Vivien Vanterpool Primary School, leaving a gaping hole there.There were large settlements at Welches and at “Grow Ground” Bottom, east of that village. The water level rose almost to the height of a 5-foot fence there, but quickly subsided.
 | | At Agriculture Department |
While there was much public concern about the effect of the flood waters, which left vehicles stranded, yards inaccessible and sections of roads impassable, much attention was paid to the Queen Elizabeth Avenue. Critics claimed that the costly reconstruction work there, between late July and early September, had made the road “worse than first” and was a waste of money. The funding to re-profile the faultysection of road, extending for some 180 meters, was used from a grant of EC$650, 000 provided to the Anguilla Government under the Caribbean Catastrophic Risk Reduction Fund. Different aspects of the workwere carried out by private contractors, with supervision by the Engineering Section of the Department of Infrastructure, to: raise the “belly” of the road by some 18 inches; refit the area with drainage pipes; and clear and re-fence the pond area for the run-off water.
 | | Vivien Vanterpool Primary School |
Even Chief Minister, Hubert Hughes, had something critical to say. Speaking on “To The Point” radio programme on Monday night, he said, “Let me say this: I did my own investigation when that job was awarded and I warned the Minister of Infrastructure keep far because that, too,might one day be investigated. I told him keep far [so] he was not involved.”(It is to be noted that the project was approved by the Executive Council of which the Chief Minister and the Minister of Infrastructure are Government members.)
 | | At Little Dix |
The Department’s Chief Engineer, Bancroft Battick, told The Anguilian that the new road work was designed for heavy rains and not the extensive flooding of the entire surrounding basin area. “We had a lot of comments on the flooding of the road. Since Lenny we have not seen rainfall like this and as a result the road has been inundated with water due to the intensity of the rain, because we got over six inchesin less than twelve hours. We have been getting significant rainfall over the past weeks, making the ground saturated, so that is one of the reasons we have had so much flooding on the island.”
 | | Anguilla Football Association stadium and football field |
Mr. Battick was asked pointedly whether the 4-5 foot flooding of the Queen Elizabeth Avenue was in fact due to a failure of the work there to correct a longstanding drainage problem.
 | | At Mount Fortune |
“What we have to understand is the topography of The Valley Bottom,” he replied.“It’s a basin, with every [stream] of water leading to it. What happened is that the design which went into that project is for a certain return period of rainfall. Lenny, for example, was a 100-year return. This flooding that we have now is quite possibly a 25-30-year return. So when you design, you don’t design for eternity. It is designed for a certain return period. Over the last 25-30 years, only twice we have had rainfall like this: Lenny and this one. There was not anything else that came close to this event where we have such flooding.”
 | | At Welches |
Mr. Battick is of the view that the only solutions to the flooding in that area were either to install “a pumping line to pump the water from The Valley Bottom into the sea, or a number of injection wells.” He added: “It is not that the system failed, but it is doing what it is designed to do under normal rainfall. This is not normal rainfall. This is unusual. This is a freak storm. We didn’t even get warnings from Antigua. This is a very unusual event and that’s why the road has been inundated. It is not like the road only. It is the whole Valley Bottom area flooded, but the water is receding.” |
