PORT MARIA, St Mary — Major flooding in the seaside town of Port Maria on Tuesday morning left residents and the authorities grappling with a massive clean-up bill and reignited calls for an improved drainage network to help lessen the impact of the recurring nightmare.

Some smaller communities such as Oracabessa, Trinity and Jack’s River were not spared the flood waters as torrential rainfall drenched sections of the parish.

The capital, Port Maria, was worst affected.

More than 100 businesses places there were flooded extensively, resulting in them being closed for the day to facilitate clean-up operations. There was also a massive pile-up of traffic outside the inundated town centre, and several commuters were stranded.

The flood water, which people in Port Maria said appeared fast and strong, also trapped people inside some buildings. At Port Maria Primary School, members of the Jamaica Fire Brigade had to assist in evacuating students and some members of staff.

“It is a serious flooding,” said Richard Creary, chairman of the St Mary Municipal Corporation.

While he toured some of the flooded areas, he appealed for the National Works Agency (NWA) to implement a drainage plan, which he said could help minimise the fallout from flooding in Port Maria.

“There is a drainage issue and there is a drainage plan for the town of Port Maria that needs to be executed,” Creary told the Jamaica Observer. “Once again, we see this situation and it is very unfair to these residents of Port Maria to have to go through this on so many occasions. I know we are going through COVID-19 and resources are tight, but we have to find the resources to carry out that drainage plan to see if we can alleviate this problem.”

Highlighting the urgency and seriousness of the situation, Creary alluded to two incidents of flooding in 2007 that he said forced some entrepreneurs out of business. “Some business people were not able to return to business; they had to close their doors. So it’s a long-standing problem that really needs to be solved now,” he said.

While noting that the municipality was still assessing the damage caused to infrastructure directly under its management, Creary stated that the NWA is the entity responsible for the drainage system in Port Maria.

When contacted, Communications Manager for the NWA Stephen Shaw said he was not aware of a drainage plan ever being devised for the town of Port Maria. However, he promised to do the necessary research.

“We have done significant work out there in Port Maria, but, once you have a lot of rain in the catchment area for Port Maria, there is always going to be the likelihood of flooding there,” Shaw said. “Port Maria is a coastal town; it is a low-lying area. If you look at Main Street in Port Maria, it ordinarily would be considered as part of the flood zone.”

Shaw further stated that the State-owned NWA is willing to assist flood victims, where possible, in returning to normality. “Anytime they have flooding like that, we assist them in removing whatever debris is there. We have done it many times before and I am sure, if the need arises, we are prepared to do it once more,” he said.

In the meantime, Member of Parliament for St Mary Central, where Port Maria is located, Dr Morais Guy, disclosed that he has started reaching out to different State agencies for assistance for people adversely affected.

He said he already had discussions with Minister of Local Government and Rural Development Desmond McKenzie, and intended to have similar talks with Minister of Labour and Social Security Karl Samuda.

“The Ministry of Labour and Social Security usually gives assistance,” Dr Guy noted.

“The flood waters have subsided, but they have left in their wake a lot of damage not only to the commercial aspects, but to many houses especially to those who live in the Frontier area of Port Maria. They have lost a lot of their belongings,” the MP said.

“The problem with Port Maria and its drainage is that it is going to be a complex problem to fix, in that Port Maria is at sea level and, in some instances, areas are below sea level. The town is surrounded by Pagee River on the eastern side and Otram River on the western side. It doesn’t really take rain to fall heavily in Port Maria for the town to get flooded,” Dr Guy explained, noting that the rivers sometimes bring flood water into the town from other parts of the parish.

He added: “The truth is that there is little that the National Works Agency can do in having a drainage plan [for Port Maria]. If you drain the water, you drain it to an area that is at sea level. So if the tides come in they are going to push back the water up into [Port Maria town] area. We are in a really precarious position. The solution to it is to try and relocate the town or if you have funds to build dykes and then have pumps continually pumping water out.”