Lots of rain

From The Source. www.stjohnsource.com. We had a lot of rain.

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DeJongh Declares State of Emergency as Otto Takes Leave of Area
By Lynda Lohr — October 8, 2010

Gov. John deJongh Jr. declared a state of emergency late Friday for the Virgin Islands due to flooding, mudslides, and power outages from Hurricane Otto, finally moving away from the region.
After a fairly dry morning, the skies turned dark and the rain moved in again Friday afternoon. However, it wasn’t nearly as bad as experienced Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday on St. Thomas and St. John but St. Croix got a deluge starting at 1:30 p.m. Late Friday afternoon, meteorologist Luis Rosa at the National Weather Service in San Juan that the worst of the day’s rain was already over. He also promised that Saturday and Sunday will be much improved.

“It will be a very nice day tomorrow and Sunday,” he said.

More rain is coming Monday as a tropical wave moves through the area, but it won’t be anything like Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. However, Rosa said there is a lot of uncertainty as to how much rain that wave will produce and what it will do after it passes through the area.

No one could be reached at the V.I. Territorial Emergency Management Agency to find out the status of the territory’s recovery from the recent deluges. Government House spokesman Jean Greaux did not return a cell phone call requesting information.

Early Friday evening, Government House sent out a press release announcing the state of emergency due to conditions related to the passage of what was then Subtropical Storm Otto.

V.I. Water and Power Authority spokesman Cassandra Dunn said there were still several problem areas on St. Croix. At Little Fountain near the island’s north side, linemen are walking into the area to make repairs because downed poles block their way and the heavy equipment needed to move them hasn’t arrived. She said that there were areas at mid island and toward the west that still have no power or only partial power.

On St. Thomas, Dunn said the Tennis Village section of Mahogany Run is without power because there was a fire on the pole. At Bolongo, lineman had to cut through 200 feet of bush in the rain to reach downed lines.

According to Dunn, St. John is in good shape.

The rain this week was certainly one for the record books. Tuesday’s 6.61 inches of rain at Cyril E. King Airport on St. Thomas was the fifth rainiest day on record. The rainiest was Sept. 8, 1953 when 11.86 inches of rain fell during Hurricane Dolly.

Tuesday’s rain also broke records for that date in both St. Thomas and St. Croix. St. Thomas’s 6.61 inches bested the old record of .67 inches set in 1981. St. Croix received 1.80 inches, more than the .73 inches that fell in 1956.

Wednesday set a new record for St. Croix. A total of 3.56 inches fell, passing the old record of 2.75 inches set in 1985.

Thursday was another record setting day on St. Thomas with 3.56 inches of rain beating the 1984 record of .95 inches.

According to the National Weather Service’s website, a total of 11.46 inches of rain fell on St. Thomas from Tuesday until noon Friday. The number stood at 6.86 inches for St. Croix.

The past few days definitely weren’t beach weather, but Caravan Gallery gift shop owner Radha Speer said that St. John visitors went shopping instead.

“They made the best of it,” she said.

At the Palms at Pelican Cove hotel on St. Croix, front desk person Pat Collins said the hotel was filled with workers on the island for a contract job at Hovensa so she wasn’t getting any complaints from them about the foul weather.

Antonia Rivera, the accounts receivable clerk at Terminex on St. Thomas, said the wet weather put a damper on company operations because the technicians couldn’t spray against bugs. But she had a good attitude.

“What can we do? It’s nature. We can enjoy it or be overwhelmed,” she said, laughing.