In­nis Fran­cis

in­nis_fran­cis@ya­hoo.com

A fam­i­ly of six, in­clud­ing a five-month-old ba­by, was yes­ter­day jolt­ed from sleep by heavy wind and rain, which caused part of the roof of their home at Rose­hill Street, Clax­ton Bay, to be torn off.

Raphael James, 56, and his com­mon-law wife Su­san Niles, 45, live in the house with their four chil­dren ages 13, ten, five, and their five-month-old ba­by. James said this was the first time in the 14 years he has lived there that he had ex­pe­ri­enced a dis­as­ter of that na­ture to his home.

“I just heard the heavy wind and when I watch I just saw sheets of gal­va­nize fly­ing off the roof in the kitchen area. This fol­low with the rain, and right now in that area is on­ly wa­ter com­ing in, we can’t cook or do noth­ing there. I will wel­come some as­sis­tance. I am a hus­tler; what­ev­er lit­tle odd end I get to do that is how we re­al­ly make a liv­ing,” he said

Niles works with CEPEP but with four chil­dren the fam­i­ly strug­gles to make ends meet

She said: “My first child is wait­ing on SEA re­sults. The ten-year-old can­not do the vir­tu­al class­es be­cause we do not have com­put­ers, a smart­phone, or the in­ter­net, so I went to the school and col­lect­ed the pack­age and when I went to re­turn it on Fri­day, the se­cu­ri­ty of­fi­cials there said he can­not take the pack­age, be­cause it have no school of­fi­cials there to col­lect it.”

The cou­ple said URP did some drainage work at the front of their home, but it was poor­ly done and it floods when­ev­er it rains. Niles said the con­tin­ued land ero­sion has caused both their front and back steps and the house foun­da­tion to weak­en, es­pe­cial­ly when it rains.

They are call­ing on the au­thor­i­ties for as­sis­tance

Coun­cilor Shazee­da Na­dia Khan-Mo­hammed said in­for­ma­tion was sent to the first re­spon­ders of the Dis­as­ter Man­age­ment Unit in the Cou­va/Tabaquite/Tal­paro Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion and a team had been dis­patched to vis­it the fam­i­ly.

There was flash flood­ing in sev­er­al parts of south Trinidad, in­clud­ing Clarke Road, and Rochard Road, Pe­nal, San Fran­cique, and Siparia. Res­i­dents said the wa­ter quick­ly sub­sided.