And now back to the storm affected areas. Like Gales Point, the floods left Mullins River’s 79 residents on an island. Three days after the floods tore through the area, and they can still only be reached by boat or helicopter. Keith Swift found out what it’s like in that community today.
Mullins River Chairlady,
“It is a really really bad flood we get. This is the worst we have ever experienced. There is no other way we can get out. When we did try to think about calling for help, when they tried to reach here – instead of going to Mullins River they went to Monkey River. But anyhow we are lucky that nobody died.”
And the scene is even more dramatic here on the Coastal Road where the violent flood waters washed away the Mullins River Bridge, disconnecting the villages of Mullins River and Gales Point from southern Belize.
Mullins River Chairlady,
“Yes nowhere we can get out of here, only from boat or helicopter. We can’t get out from the road, even to go to Gales Point again which is our nearest grocery shop we still can’t get there.”
Albert Lesmore, Mullins River Resident
“Well what happened is that my whole house got messed up with everything inside it, all my mattress and everything were completely destroyed; everything inside. So I went to Dangriga to buy some mattress and we bought butane for the tank and thing and on the way people donate a lot of groceries to issue to give the villagers and thing. So I came across to get it.
What really happened is I used my canoe to bring it up in the bus, I crossed it, and then my father in law lent me his pickup to go to Dangriga with.”
As we said, our team is just back about half an hour ago and we’ll have more on the flood affected areas in tomorrow’s newscast.
