St Philip South DEO Annual Church Service

The annual Church Service of the St. Philip South District Emergency Organisation is scheduled to take place on Sunday, June 7, 2009 at the Kirton's New Testament Church.

The Service will commence at 9.00 a.m., members are asked to make a special effort to attend.

Mild Earthquake Recorded In Barbados

USGS, USA: Seismometers of the US Geological Survey recorded an earthquake of magnitude 4.7 on the Richter Scale at a depth of 12 miles approximately 55 miles ENE of Bridgetown, the capital of Barbados, early Sunday morning (01:13 A.M. Local - 05:13 UTC).

http://earthquake.usgs.gov/eqcenter/recenteqsww/Quakes/us2009haau.php

Names Of Deadly 2008 Hurricanes Retired

The names Gustav, Ike and Paloma will never be associated with future hurricanes or tropical storms on account of their deadly romp through the Caribbean last year, the United States National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has announced.

The storms claimed more than 200 lives and left a trail of destruction calculated in the billions across the region from August to November 2008.

Under the normal six-year rotation, the names would have been up to be used again in 2014. However, they will be replaced by Gonzalo, Isaias and Paulette.

A NOAA spokesman said the names were retired for reasons of sensitivity.

"That's why you'll never hear the name Katrina again or Andrew, for that matter. It would be very inappropriate," Dennis Feltgen said on Friday.

Hurricane Gustav slammed into Haiti as a Category One hurricane in August, killing 77 people before tearing into Cuba as a powerful Category Four system.

More than 80 people were killed as a result of Hurricane Ike in the Caribbean. The Turks and Caicos Islands, the Southeastern Bahamas and Cuba were among the worst impacted.

The Cuban government said Paloma, which became the second strongest November hurricane on record, reaching Category 4 destroyed more than 1,400 homes and causing about US$300 million in damage on the island.

St. Philip South DEO - Meeting May 12, 2009

Members of the St. Philip South District Emergency Organisation are reminded of our monthly meeting on Tuesday, May 12, 2009 at the St. Martin's Mangrove Primary School, St. Martin, St. Philip at 8:00 p.m.

Members of the public with an interest in the District Emergency Organisation are also invited to attend.

Gray Predicts Average 2009 Hurricane Season

Predictions released by Colorado State University’s of leading forecaster, Professor William Gray, calls for an average hurricane season in 2009. A press statement issued by Professor Gray and his team said that based on the potential for a weak El Nino event and an observed cooling of tropical Atlantic sea surface temperatures, the number of hurricanes developing in 2009 would decrease.

Gray indicates that this hurricane season will be an average season with six hurricanes developing; with the risk that a major hurricane making landfall in the Caribbean is average as well. The forecasters said there would be a total of 12 named storms, including six hurricanes. Of those hurricanes, two are expected to develop into at least Category Three strength, or higher.

In 2008, there were 16 named storms including eight hurricanes, five of them were major.

Professor Gray, who is beginning his 26th year forecasting hurricanes at Colorado State University said; "We expect current weak La Nina conditions to transition to neutral and perhaps weak El Nino conditions by this year's hurricane season. If El Nino conditions develop for this year's hurricane season, it would tend to increase levels of vertical wind shear and decrease levels of Atlantic hurricane activity."

Professor Gray and his team also mentioned that they have seen uncharacteristic cooling of sea surface temperatures in the tropical Atlantic over the past few months. These cooler waters are associated with dynamic and thermodynamic factors that are less conducive for an active Atlantic hurricane season. Those factors are similar to conditions that occurred during 1951, 1968, 1976, 1985 and 2001 seasons. On average, those five seasons had average activity, and Gray and lead forecaster Phil Klotzbach predict the 2009 season will have activity in line with those years.

Barbados Is On High Alert For Swine Flu

BARBADOS is on high alert for swine flu! While there were no known cases here up to yesterday afternoon, health authorities announced the implementation of a national action plan to mitigate the deadly virus that has claimed several lives in Mexico and spread to other countries including two of Barbados’ key tourist markets – the United States and Canada.
Officials were also monitoring the situation with two local sports teams – football and polo – who are set to return from Mexico “in the near future”, indicating they would have to report to port health officials on their arrival back home.

The island’s heightened state of action was announced by Minister of Health, Donville Inniss, and Chief Medical Officer (CMO), Dr. Joy St. John, following an emergency meeting of all major public sector agencies and some private bodies at the Pan-American Health Organisation’s Dayrell’s Road, Christ Church headquarters.

Key provisions of the national plan, influenced by the World Health Organisation’s decision to deem the current swine flu outbreak “a public health emergency of international concern” included:

• heightened surveillance at all ports of entry in Barbados including the Grantley Adams International Airport and Bridgetown Port and well as the Ministry of Health’s laboratory.

• declarations to port health personnel by all people entering Barbados from Mexico and other infected places within the last week to 10 days.

• circulation of guidelines on diagnosis and treatment to all private doctors.

• careful management of the island’s limited supplies of the anti-viral using Tamiflu.

• polyclinics will be the first line of treatment for mild cases including those of tourists.

The swine flu virus refers to influenza cases that are caused by Orthomyxoviruses that are endemic to pig populations. Symptoms are similar to those of other strains of human flu, including fever, cough, sore throat, body aches, headache, chills and fatigue, while diarrhoea and vomiting can also occur.

Inniss said urged all members of the public to immediately adopt precautionary measures recommended by the experts including frequent hand washing with soap and water, covering the mouth and nose with tissue when sneezing or coughing and seeking urgent medical attention if they have the stated symptoms.

“Government is working assiduously to effectively manage the situation as we know it at this time, and we will continue to work collectively to implement our plan of action to protect the health of Barbadians. We will keep monitoring the international events and update the public as the situation unfolds,” the minister said.

St. John said while the WHO had not declared a pandemic authorities needed to be on alert, especially since “this virus is not like any other that we have had in the world before.”

“Suffice it to say that we want to make it clear to the general population that we are going to keep abreast of current events and we are going to communicate to them frequently about their involvement because it’s not just the ministries and different agencies that have to respond,” she said.

“There has to be responsibility on the part of the general public and that’s why it is important if there have travelled that they declare, it is important that wherever they travelled to that they exhibit the precautions of hand washing, alcohol gels are also useful.”

The CMO made it clear Barbadians who were inoculated with the seasonal influenza vaccine were not protected from swine flu.

She also said currently there was vaccination offering protection from the current virus, adding that the drugs Tamiflu, of which Barbados had a supply from Cricket World Cup, and Relenza were successfully treating cases of the illness.

“We are going to be using these judiciously. We are not in a position where we need to use them as profolaxis for front line workers and I am not just talking medical staff, the front-line workers are well know to us because we have been generally immunising them as needs to be,” she noted.

“We are keeping a close eye on developing events when that is necessary we will inform the general public very specifically of who, when and where we will be employing of our very precious stocks of Tamiflu.”

Source: www.barbadosadvocate.com