FRIDAY i’m lovin’ it!
HIGH 91ºF LOW 77ºF
The Tribune L ATEST NE WS ON TRIBUNE242.COM
CLOUDS, T-STORM
The People’s Paper
Hurricane Special Edition
ALL CLEAR
Volume: 112 No.209
FRIDAY, OCTOBER 7, 2016
PRICE - $1 (Abaco / Grand Bahama $1.50)
The Bahamas starts to recover from monstrous Matthew PEOPLE move in to clear up at the United Fellowship Outreach Ministries International on South Beach Road, which was among many properties hit hard by Hurricane Matthew. Photos: Shawn Hanna/Tribune Staff By RASHAD ROLLE Tribune Staff Reporter rrolle@tribunemedia.net HURRICANE Matthew left behind a trail of destruction, flooding, downed lamp poles and electrical lines and residents eager to re-establish normal lives after battering the Bahamas for three days as a dangerous category three and four storm. No reports of serious injuries or death occurred as a result of the hurricane, but an elderly man died from a heart attack after being airlifted from Andros to New Providence during the storm. With the sting of last year’s Hurricane Joaquin in the minds of many, fears that similar catastrophic levels would impact the southern Bahamas were allayed when the eye of Matthew missed most of those islands, causing minimal damage to them.
A PACKED Esso Gas Station after Hurricane Matthew. Instead, Matthew saved toring the possibility that its full force for the north- the storm could “loop” ern islands, including New and head back toward the Providence, which received northern Bahamas as a siga direct hit from such a nificantly weakened tropipoweful hurricane for the cal storm. “We are fortunate in the first time since 1929, and Grand Bahama, which ap- country that it has had minpeared to have been hit imal impact on the islands hardest by the hurricane’s in the south that have had Hurricane Joaquin impact140mph conditions. Officials are still moni- ed and so we have to thank
God for his mercies in that regard,” Prime Minister Perry Christie said on Friday after a Cabinet meeting at the head office of the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA). “We are awaiting the full assessments from Exuma. Obviously we were impacted strongly in New Providence and tremendously in
North Andros and Grand Bahama.” Mr Christie and other officials were expected to visit Grand Bahama on Friday afternoon. “The representative for West End and Bimini have told us that quite a number of homes have been destroyed, many of them damaged,” he said. “And as we were monitoring last night we are now hearing of significant damage in Freeport and we note that the impact was strong there in Grand Bahama, period.” Indeed, the island administrator for West Grand Bahama, Brenda Colebrooke, told The Tribune 95 per cent of the homes in the Eight Mile Rock and Holmes Rock area were severely damaged, as roofs caved in and portions of homes were blown out. On Friday afternoon, Yamacraw and South Beach also continued to experi-
ence severe flooding. Bahamians, however, wasted little time beginning to clean-up up the islands. Even amid windy, rainy, tropical storm conditions on Thursday evening some residents took to the streets. Long queues of people lined up at gas stations and fast-food restaurants throughout Friday. Others picked up chain saws and cutlasses and began mowing down and removing the large trees and branches that had blocked passages in roads and homes. Residents in southern New Providence left their shelters and returned to their constituencies, often finding cars nearly submerged and flooding to homes. Banks on Friday were also working to restore ATMs and to provide limited in-store banking services on Saturday. SEE PAGE SIX
MORE THAN 400 RESCUED ‘WAVES FOUR FEET HIGH FROM HOMES BY POLICE BURST INTO MY HOME’ By SANCHESKA DORSETT Tribune Staff Reporter sdorsett@tribunemedia.net MORE THAN 400 pople were rescued from their homes in eastern and southern New Providence as flood waters began to rise more than four feet during the passage of Hurricane Matthew, according to Commissioner of Police Ellison Greenslade. In an interview with ZNS
at the Hurricane Command Center, Commissioner Greenslade said officers began to get calls around 8am on Thursday that residents were “experiencing difficulty” with flooding and tidal surges. He said officers, with the assistance of community partners, mobilised tractors and “really large dump trucks” to assist with rescue efforts. SEE PAGE SIX
By TANEKA THOMPSON Tribune News Editor tmthompson@tribunemedia.net
RONALD Woodside was at home in his seaside house on South Beach Road with his parents on Thursday, when waves about “four feet” high burst into the building, forcing the family to flee to the second floor. Mr Woodside, 23, said the powerful waves surged through the back door,
which faces the sea, before knocking out two windows. The devastating storm surge from Hurricane Matthew “ripped up” sheetrock in his home, leaving him, his mother and father, with little time to escape to the second floor. The family did not evacuate the home ahead of the storm despite warnings from officials, but were SEE PAGE THREE