One of the things that irritates me about living in the U.S. Virgin Islands, specifically on St. Thomas, is the mass media tends to ignore us when it comes to the coverage of potential storms. We are a small group of islands with a combined population of less then 150,000 people.
With storms that may effect us, the major weather services always project the path of storms as they will hit Florida and the Eastern sea board of the mainland, often that path is close to or directly over the U.S. Virgin Islands. Puerto Rico may get an honorable mention but we rarely do. You learn very quickly which specks we are on the map and your antenna quickly goes up.
Fortunately we have VITEMA, The Virgin Islands Territorial Emergency Management Agency. If you subscribe to their alerts, you can be kept up to date on developments via your cell phone, The official website is www.VITEMA.gov. Another good website for watching the progress of storms is www.wunderground.com.
September is the month the most destructive storms have hit the U.S. Virgin Islands and so it it a time of heighten alert. As a result, you are always making decisions on how many precautions to take.
Just before Tropical Storm Katie hit, I was in the process of putting a new roof on my home and I was also scheduled to leave for the mainland. My roofers managed to get the house under cover before her arrival and my flight took off into black ominous clouds that burst into torrential rains that evening. Prior to the storm, the conversation was that it was nothing to worry about. My pre-storm focus was to rush the contractor and pray it was mild. I didn't have much of a choice. There are people who provide the service of closing shutters. I had my home partially shuttered, covering the front of my home where there are large impact resistant glass doors. For us, Katie turned out to be high winds, a lot of rain over several days, some flooding and long electrical losses for some parts of the island others never lost service. She did a lot more damage on the mainland.
More recently,Tropical Storm Maria was on her way. It was not projected to be a hurricane, it was not organized but winds up to 75 miles an hour were anticipated. The roof is on but not caulked or painted on the inside. I urged the contractor to remove construction debris from the yard and I put up all of my shutters. filled the car, filled my diesel containers for the generator, stocked up on water, batteries and food. Maria took a jog to the North and resulted in a few gentle rains and some hazy days, much to our relief.
A lot of work? Yes. I would rather be prepared than caught un-prepared. The key is not to get complacent, which can be easy to do. I didn't live in the Virgin Islands when Marilyn hit but I understand it was not supposed to be much of a storm and it developed into a category 4 within hours, destroying many homes and lives. People who survived it are still traumatized when they think about any storm.
Always prepare fully for the worse, if it comes you will be ahead of the game. This time of year there always seems to be one brewing.
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