Hurricane Maria and Final Recovery

What Hurricane Irma did not destroy, Hurricane Maria finished off with wind and deluge of rain.

Rescue teams—-the military and private , had left St. John just a few days before since they were warned Maria was about to hit. Unfortunately, many visitors and locals had evacuated to St Croix and Puerto Rico after hurricane Irma awaiting for flights to the States. These poor people would end up suffering through another frightening and devastating hurricane. Even though Hurricane Maria did arrive on St. John, its path veered toward St. Croix and Puerto Rico and the destruction that was dealt to St. John by Irma was keenly felt by these two islands.

Puerto Rico would go on to have 91.61 billion in losses, over 3000 lives lost, and be without power for the worst blackout in US history lasting several months with 45% of Puerto Ricans still not having power after three months …. that is 1.5 million people!!! Years later, heads of the Department of Homeland Security stated in the aftermath of Maria President Trump suggested “selling Puerto Rico“ or swap Puerto Rico for Greenland because “Puerto Rico was dirty and the people are poor”🤬

Back on St. Thomas, after Maria, Royal Caribbean Cruises started bringing much needed supplies and rescuing people off the islands. The BBC Power Company from Missouri brought hundreds of lineman and trucks to put utility poles back up on St. Thomas and St. John.

It would be more than SIX weeks later that the majority of people would finally have power ,some people were without power for THREE months! Compare that to Texans who were without power for 8-12 days after Hurricane Harvey and the huge media uproar and screams for accountability. Puerto Rico, St. Thomas, St. Croix and St. John were barely in the news.☹️

Also months later on St. Thomas, the one and only hospital there, 2/3 of the beds were unavailable due to damage and staffing shortage. An offshore military floating medical facility was dispatched to help take care of critical needs.

On St. John, it was really the private sector who started to rebuild St. John. Private money came in to create teams of roofers, electricians and Bloomberg‘s disaster advisors teamed up with government officials on St. Thomas, St. John and St. Croix. Love for Love City Foundation (started by Kenny Chesney) and Love City Strong Foundation were making sure families could have clean drinking water , remove mold out of homes and develop a program to rebuild 200 low to middle income homes since FEMA was only awarded 1.8 billion for the three Virgin Islands. This was not enough to rebuild hospitals and schools and the Trump administration placed unexpected stipulations on the money and even one year later they only received 240 million. The only medical clinic on St. John was housed in a trailer and the main public school was not rebuilt. Gifft Hill school, usually a private school, opened their doors to the island children to attend for free or at a reduced rate since their two campuses were not severely damaged.

Another concern were the animals from the ACC animal shelter that could not be taken care of. The ACC manager, Ryan Moore, and friends were able to get 100+ animals evacuated with the help of these philanthropic groups.🤗

Even our humble little church on St. John, Freshwater Church, got volunteers from the states to help clear debris and patch up homes.

And cleared debris from the pavilion shelter where we would have church at Hawksnest Beach.

Interestingly enough, a couple of years prior, Freshwater church had approached St. John officials trying to formulate a hurricane disaster preparedness program for St. John since , after all, it is an island and they didn’t have one in place 😰Unfortunately, when they tried to have a few meetings with them, they were met with disinterest and gave up the plan. After hurricanes Irma and Maria, Freshwater Church took it upon themselves to buy two shipping containers and fill them with generators, chainsaws, water, medical supplies, canned food, etc. They placed them at each end of the island so if this type of disaster would happen again each end would have access to the supplies.

Five years later, St. John is almost back to its prior self. Many businesses, hotels and restaurants sadly did not survive. But the spirit of the people did not die and it formed a special bond of what they call themselves, “Irmaria” survivors. They helped each other get through the worst disaster the island had ever faced. They suffered through a lack of electricity, cell service, water supplies, food supplies, generators, fuel and cash availability. Impassable roads, flat tires and damaged vehicles. No A/C and leaky roofs. Sifting through their destroyed property looking for anything salvageable. Not being able to swim in the ocean for relief from the unbearable heat because of all the pollution from the debris and runoff into the water. Yet, they stayed and rebuilt. That’s Love City strength and resilience❤️

And nature has a way of repairing itself. It took a few years but the majority of trees are back in full bloom and the ocean is clear. Thank God!